


the ol' ball and chain

by slipsthrufingers



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Arranged Marriage, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Forced Marriage, i am just living my truth here in AU land, i'm just enjoying writing a bad time!!, making it clear right now that i'm not thinking hard about this, politics aint my game child, the fic formally known as 'dungeon husband', the wider implications? i don't know her!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-16
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:28:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 32,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24759331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slipsthrufingers/pseuds/slipsthrufingers
Summary: A war wages about through the kingdom.A castle is besieged.A woman marries a man to forge peace.A Forced Marriage AU.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 457
Kudos: 606





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I don't really know who to blame specifically for this, but I'm sure there is someone who deserves it. The premise is vaguely inspired by #19 from [this list](https://angel-deux-writes.tumblr.com/post/613936358805962752/arrangedforced-marriage-au-prompts):
> 
> _19: I knew you didn’t want to marry me because we stole your lands and my dad killed your dad and enslaved your people and all, but when they dragged you to the altar in chains, sheesh, that’s a bit too much, isn’t it?_.
> 
> Thank you to those people who helped make this better. Even if they're the ones who were egging me into this bad decision in the first place.
> 
> Content warnings for graphic descriptions of violence, though only in this chapter.

When they bring Jaime Lannister to the sept he is still in chains. Heavy manacles drag his wrists down to his hips and he has been gagged with a foul-looking cloth. His clothes are little more than rags and he smells truly disgusting. But then, he has spent months marinating in his own filth in the dungeons of Storm’s End, so that is to be expected.

But his eyes are clear.

Clear and furious.

Clear and furious and looking directly at her.

“Do you understand what is to happen here tonight?” The septon asks him. He does not take his eyes from her, but he nods.

“Must he be chained?” she asks Renly. He is standing beside her in his armour, strong and shiny and tall. His jaw is clenched, and Brienne suspects he is on the verge of tears. She would not think less of him if he did cry. He had not thought to be the head of his house, let alone so young. In a time of war.

So when he had asked this of her, she had agreed. But seeing her husband-to-be dragged before her, bound and gagged. It is uncomfortable.

"Yes," Renly says firmly. “But he has agreed to the terms of the marriage, lest we send his brother's corpse to keep him company in his cell."

Ser Jaime turns his deadly gaze to Renly now. It was scathing when it was turned on her, but seeing it directed at her friend makes her heart pound wildly in her chest. Baratheons and Lannisters. Lions and stags. And her there as a tie to bind it all together.

How had this happened?

* * *

The sept is dark. It is night and the endless siege means candles are rationed. Some small part of her thinks it suits her. A political marriage forged in darkness. That was all she'd ever been able to hope for. She just hadn't expected it to be so literal.

_All women are the same in the dark,_ her septa had told her. Perhaps it might be true.

She is led to the altar by Renly, who stands at her side where her father should have been. Lannister is led behind her by his guards. When he stands and faces her he narrows his eyes and looks her up and down, then he straightens his spine the way that all men do when they realise how tall she truly is. He is almost of a height with her. Perhaps he would be, if he were in new boots, rather than his old worn pair. Instead he looks up at her slightly. His burnished curls lie tangled and dirty around his face.

The ceremony itself is short. The septon does away with the usual prayers and florid speeches and gets straight to the vows. “My lords and ladies. We stand here in the sight of gods and men to witness the union of man and wife. One flesh, one heart, one soul, now and forever.”

Brienne’s heart clenches in her chest at the words, but she does not protest. This was not what she’d imagined her wedding to be like, to be sure. But lately she had not thought she’d have a wedding at all. So she pushes down the bubbling of feelings prickling her skin into goosebumps and instead looks her husband-to-be in the eyes. She does not want him thinking her weak or scared, or that she is anything other than willing. He looks back at her, his green eyes still cloudy with anger.

The septon clears his throat, drawing her attention away from Lannister. He gestures to their hands. She does not want to touch him, does not want him touching her, but it is part of the ceremony, so she leans forward and takes his right in hers. He is still manacled, and the movement drags his left up higher too. It draws her attention to the dark bruises on each wrist; surely the irons pain him. But he shows no signs of discomfort. Does not flinch. His fingers are loose around her palm, but still they are curled. She can feel his matching calluses rubbing softly against her own.

The septon recites his prayer as he ties the ribbon around their hands. Brienne does not truly hear it. She worries that Lannister can feel her thrumming pulse in their joined hands. Worries that he will misconstrue why her heart pounds.

There is a pause then, and the septon looks awkwardly between them, pointedly looking at the filthy cloth still shoved in Lannister’s mouth. “It is time for the vows.”

She hesitates for a fraction of a second, but reaches out with her unbound hand to pull the filthy rag from his mouth. The smell of it gets in her nostrils and makes her gag; it must have been disgusting to have stifling his tongue.

He works his mouth a little, tongue darting out to wet his cracked lips, but he does not speak.

“Look upon each other and say the vows,” the septon prompts, and Brienne returns her gaze to Lannister. His grip on her hand tightens ever so slightly.

There is some slight shift in his eyes, a slight darkening, and they begin to speak in unison. 

“Father, Smith, Warrior, Mother, Maiden, Crone, Stranger.”

It is the first time she has heard his voice. Croaky with misuse, but strong and clear enough for their purpose. She is so intent on his words that she can barely hear her own voice. Her throat tightens. 

“I am his and he is mine.”

“I am hers and she is mine.”

Everything slows. Neither blinks. Her heart flutters wildly in her chest.

“From this day until the end of my days,” they finish together. 

In the distance a bell rings. It startles her. She looks away, over her shoulder. The changing of the guard. She will be needed on the walls. Her hand is still bound.

“Will that be enough?” Renly says, surprising her again. 

The septon hesitates. It is not a binding ceremony yet. Not without a bedding. They’re all aware of that much.

“I am bound as much as she is,” Lannister says to Renly. His grip on her hand has not wavered. The ribbon feels as if it has tightened more in the passing minutes. “Let me see my brother and I’ll agree to any story you wish.”

Renly glares. “Your brother will be kept hostage until your father retreats. Same as you.”

“I’ve done everything you said.” He pulls away from her a little, but bound as they are the movement tugs her closer. He tries to use his spare hand to untie the ribbon but the shackles make that impossible. 

“Yes.” Renly agrees, and pulls a dagger from his belt. Brienne steps forward, but he stops her with a hand on her breastplate, restraining her. He uses the dagger to sever the ribbon, then turns to Lannister’s guards. “Take him back to the dungeon.”

The guards jump at the order.

“Renly!” Lannister says, resisting. But he has been held in the dungeons for some time; he is weak and he is chained. “Let me see him. He’s a _child_.”

Brienne looks between the two men. Something is caught in her throat. She swallows it down.

He is led out of the sept, struggling all the way. His cries become more furious, more panicked, until he is out of earshot. Returned to his dungeon. At her side Renly is unmoved. 

The septon makes some excuse, bows and leaves just Brienne and Renly alone. Her right hand clutches the shredded ribbon. She still holds the filthy gag in her left. It gives her the courage to ask what she had avoided asking this whole time.

“If he finds out we don’t have his brother…” 

“He won’t,” Renly says firmly, then he, too, leaves the sept, leaving Brienne standing alone between the statue of the Mother and the Father. 

* * *

It is a week before Brienne sees her husband again. She is escorting another prisoner to his cell and must pass by the one occupied by Renly’s ‘guest of honour’. The man struggles against her hold, cries, screams, begs, generally makes quite a scene but it does him no good. She is bigger than him and stronger than him and she’s not swayed by his pleading with her to: “Think of my family! I have a young wife! Who will look after her if you lock me in here?”

“Better she learns young that you cannot depend on men if you want to survive in this world,” she says, and pushes the man into his cell. The guard with her closes the door behind and locks it.

“I did not realise I married such a cold woman,” a voice says from behind, startling her. She had been so occupied with the prisoner she had forgotten who else was down here. It had been all she could do all week to put it to the back of her mind. Perhaps she’d done a better job of it than she’d thought.

She turns to see that he has made his way to the door, hands wrapped around the heavy iron bars fixed in the small window at head-height. His face is pressed against them, nose poking between two bars so that he has a better view of the hallway and all its many, varied entertainments. Even from here, obscured as he is, she can see he is even more filthy than he had been in the sept.

Brienne knows she should not rise to the bait, because that is what this clearly is. Renly had warned her of this, that he would try to goad her into a conversation. _All Lannisters lie, it is all they know how to do_ , he had told her to justify his marriage scheme. _We must lie to them in turn, if we are to defeat them._

But she is tired. Tired of the day, of the war, and she wants nothing more than to be back in her bed, and in this moment of weakness she says, despite herself, “That man is lucky he isn’t dead.”

She cannot see his face, but she hears his noise of disbelief well enough. “I’m guilty of no crimes, other than that I was born the son of Tywin Lannister and for that they shackled me to you. I hate to think what crime this man did that should have him _dead_.”

“He... took advantage of a serving girl,” she says, glancing over his shoulder at the cell of the man in question. That cell has no bars, only one very high window it would be impossible to see out of. It’s what the man deserves.

She expects Lannister to scoff at that, as several of the other lords upstairs had done when she’d brought the man before Renly to be judged. If the girl had gone to any of them with her bruised throat and her torn dress she expects the rest of them would’ve finished the job. It was what men did, afterall. They were all beasts incapable of controlling their basest of urges.

But he does not scoff. He leans in closer, until his nose is peeking out between the bars. His green eyes catch the firelight so that they flash alarmingly. “Is she all right?” he asks, quieter than she expects.

She hesitates a moment, but cannot see how it would matter for him to know. “She’ll be fine,” she says, then drags her eyes away from him and back up the hallway, back towards her tower room and her bed and the end of this conversation.

* * *

The ribbon she kept, the one that bound their hands together, though she does not know why. It’s draped over the edge of the small looking glass in her room, the one she avoids looking at unless forced. Sometimes she does such a good job at ignoring the glass, she forgets it’s there, only to be frightened when she catches her own reflection moving in it as she moves about the room.

The ribbon dangles there, its frayed, messy ends proof that it did happen. That she has a husband. He will never warm her bed, of course, nor ever be her true husband, not in the eyes of the gods.

She had never really thought she would marry. Even when she had been betrothed it had seemed such a far-off thing. Each one a contract planned for years before it would be sealed, and broken every time besides. One ended by death. One ended by her own distasteful face. The last at the tip of her sword. 

And yet her true betrothal and wedding had taken place in the space of half an hour. It was easy to forget it had happened.

But the ribbon is there. 

The ribbon is proof.

She is married.

* * *

Brienne doesn’t see her husband for another month. It isn’t that she avoids him, she just has no reason to go down into the dungeons. The siege has held, but they are well provisioned and the unrest among the men has settled down now that they have made examples of the few who could not control their urges.

She is reviewing a scout report when a voice calls up to her where she stands on the battlements. “Look, it is my Lady Lannister.”

Against all her better judgement, she freezes. It is not that it is a secret. That she married the man at Renly’s request is common knowledge throughout the castle, as is the unwritten rule that it should not be discussed. She did not command it of her men, and she doubts that Renly did either, but the fact that no one has brought it up around her, even in passing, has not gone unnoticed.

So it is all the more jarring to be confronted with it so openly.

Brienne looks down to see that he is in leg irons, chained to several other prisoners and tethered to the bars of the dog cage by the stables. Even from this distance she can see that he is even more filthy than he had been on their wedding night. 

She ignores him, but turns to the soldier who had delivered her the report. “What are they doing with the prisoners?” she asks.

“Lady Lannister!” he calls again, seeing her watching him.

“I don’t know m’lady,” he says with a frown.

Each cry is more and more mocking to her ears. And all the more easily ignored.

“Get someone to find out,” she says, then steps closer to the embrasures, so that she is out of sight of her husband. It means she must look out across the fields where his father’s army surrounds them on all sides.

Perhaps Tywin Lannister has scouts of his own watching the battlements even now. She wonders if they have spied her, whether they recognise her. Whether the news of her marriage to the heir to Casterly Rock has reached them there too, where they sprawl like some kind of hideous infection polluting the countryside.

Better they see her than him.

Below, her husband calls her a third time, sounding almost desperate. “Lady Lannister!”

She does not reply. Words are wind and up here where she stands on the battlements she can feel a strong wind blowing. It carries his cries away. In the distance she can see heavy clouds forming, dark and full of rain. A storm is brewing.

Brienne retreats inside before the rain sets in.

* * *

Sometimes it is easy to forget that she is married. That she has a husband. Her life has not changed in any of the ways it should have changed now she has one. She still wears men’s clothes. Still carries her sword, fights when she can. She still sleeps alone, barring the door to her chambers every night. 

But when she does remember, it is when she lies abed, surrounded by the cool night air and her thoughts.

In the dark here, no one is to know what she thinks of. What she remembers. As a girl she had dreamed of knights and ladies and the romance of the songs, even when the world was determined to remind her that would never be her story. 

It’s hard to admit that they were right.

The songs were never about her.

* * *

It is not that she avoids the dungeon. Because that would mean she worries about what she will find down there. She knows what she will find there.

Her husband.

Her husband and all the other criminals and prisoners that day by day increase in number.

Avoiding it would be cowardly, and she is not a coward. She has faced many opponents, bigger men than her, better trained men, and she has beat them all into the dust. 

If she had reason to visit the dungeons, she would venture there.

But she doesn’t.

But she is not a coward.

She just doesn’t have a reason.

* * *

It is late when she is woken from her sleep. It had been a restless sleep, in fact she had slept poorly for weeks, so at first when she wakes she does not realise she was woken _by_ something. It is just that she is awake, again, when she so desperately wishes she was asleep.

But then the banging on the door continues. Harsh and loud and so hard it rattles the door at its hinges. Instinct has her reaching for her sword. “My lady!” a voice calls from without. A voice she does not recognise. “My lady, wake up!”

It breaks through the fog of sleep. She pushes back the covers and retrieves her sword belt from where she always leaves it, leaning up against the edge of the bed. Its weight is grounding; she feels more alert the instant she grips the pommel.

“My lady!”

Brienne strides to the door, wearing nothing but her threadbare sleep shirt. She unlocks the door and opens it, sword at the ready to deal with whatever faces her on the other side--perhaps the siege has broken and the castle is swarming with Lannister soldiers, or perhaps it is a rebellion within their own ranks. Whatever comes, she will face it armed and ready to fight, and that is what matters.

But it is just a servant. A young boy she recognises, though she cannot for the life of her remember his name. “My lady!” he says, then his eyes take in her appearance, her bare legs, her wild hair and he flushes, precious in his innocence. “There is a problem in the dungeons,” he says, forcing his eyes back to her face. “Lord Renly bids you attend it.”

She frowns. “What happened to the guards?”

But the boy doesn’t answer, scurrying away back down the hall. She is left standing undressed in her doorway, the cold of the night air drawing her nipples to peaks, even through her shift.

She retreats before she advances. Finds yesterday’s clothes--a dirty blue tunic, breeches and solid boots--and pulls them on before she leaves her room. Whatever might await her below can wait until she is properly dressed.

Later, she wonders what would have happened if she’d followed orders quickly. If it would have changed anything.

If she would have changed anything.

* * *

The dungeon is well lit when she arrives, and noisier than it should be. Every prisoner in every cell is awake. Most are yelling. The tight hallways and low ceilings only make the cacophony worse--every noise echoes off every surface threefold, making it feel as though the entire enemy army is somehow encased within the stone walls. The guards have lit all of the torches, so she has no problem navigating until she arrives at his cell.

Because of course that is where the problem is.

Him.

Guards line the walls, each one young and scared, and they all look to her with a puzzling mix of terror and relief. Still she cannot say why.

“What is going on?” she asks the nearest guard.

He pales further, glances between her and the locked door.

It is _his_ cell.

Her husband.

“The cells have been filling for some time,” he explains in a rushed whisper, “We have been running out of room. So my lord ordered we house several prisoners in one cell.”

And then she hears it.

The laughter.

It is not his laughter. She has heard him speak on only three occasions, and never once has she heard him laugh, but _that_ is not him, of that she is certain. This laugh is terrifying. Maniacal.

“Who is in there with him?” she asks, sure that they will be able to hear the shake of her voice, or the pounding beat of her heart. Even above the jeers and yowls of the prisoners excited by whatever has happened behind this door.

Another guard steps forward. “They call him the fool, my lady.”

“The fool?”

“He wears the hat of a court jester, and plays at jokes as they do, but…” the same guard explains, and pales. Looks positively green in the scant firelight. 

Inside the cell, the man laughs again.

“Both were chained to walls on either side of the cell, but the fool broke free of the shackles, somehow, and… It is hard to see what he has done, but we have heard nothing from your husband, since--”

For half a heartbeat, the bedlam in the dungeons breaks into a soft lull, as though even the most raucous of prisoners had heard the guard’s transgression. Speaking of what he should not. Breaking the unwritten rule that has, nonetheless, been scrupulously followed by every inhabitant of Storm’s End since that night.

The guard flinches back, realising his grave error too late. But she does not react. Her many years of practice schooling her emotions, hiding them behind an impassive expression, serve her well, and instead she draws in a deep breath of rancid air. It steadies her.

“Very well,” she says, calmly. Coolly. She draws her sword from its scabbard. “Open the door and step back.”

They do as she commands. For all their mockery in the daylight, they do trust in her skill. One guard steps forward to grasp the latch, while the others step back. Inside the cell the laughter rings once more, followed by the sound of something heavy and fleshy hitting stone.

On her signal, the guard opens the door and she steps forward, sword raised. The cell is filthy, the firelight from the torches in the hallway only lighting a fraction of the space, but it is light enough to see the carnage.

There is blood everywhere. 

So much blood. 

In the dim light it is black like tar, but it is the way it pools near the body that makes her sweat. The man she married is lying face down in the muck, unmoving. Perhaps he is breathing, she doesn’t get a chance to check. His cellmate uses her shock to his advantage, leaping from behind the door to attack her from behind.

His arms wrap tightly around her throat as he jumps into her back, throttling her from behind with strength that is more surprising than it is brutal. She brings her free hand up to grip his wrist, and he laughs in her ear, a maniacal cackle so close she can feel his wet breath on her skin. He squeezes her neck tighter still. For a moment, white lights appear in her vision, constellations in the darkness. But just for a moment. 

Brienne holds tight to his wrist and curls forward with a jerk, using her superior height and strength against him; wrenching him forward and pulling him from the ground. He kicks his feet against the back of her legs, but if he hurts her, she doesn’t feel it. Instead she arcs backwards, while still holding him in place, until she rams him into the stone wall. Hard.

It works. His hold breaks and she wheels around with her sword at the ready, prepared to run him through, but she sees at once there is no need; she has knocked him unconscious.

“He is subdued.” she calls to the guards without, hoping they don’t notice the way her voice shakes. “Bring chains. And a light.”

They do as she commands, and soon the cell is filled with more men than it is designed to hold. But two bind the fool quickly, and drag him from the room, and it is then she turns her attention properly to his victim.

Lannister still lies still, has not moved at all, despite the scuffle, and it sends a chill down her spine. She sheaths her sword and moves to kneel beside his body. One of the guards brings his torch near, the soft glow doing nothing to help improve the grey pallor of his skin.

And then there is the blood.

She cannot see the wound, but the pool of blood beneath him does not bode well. She wishes one of the guards would take the lead and flip him over to see the damage done. But she knows none of them will. If they could not manage the fool without her, she cannot rely on them to do what needs to be done now. Like all difficult things, she must do them herself.

She crouches down beside him, grasps him by the shoulder and the hip, taking care to check for any wounds as she does. But she feels nothing but skin and bone through ragged cloth, so she steels herself and turns him carefully. His head lolls to the side, golden curls and burnished beard catching the firelight, his sharp nose and soft lips looking too beautiful and fine to be splattered with gore.

For the wound is plain to see. It is on his neck, a jagged red rip through his creamy skin, the only consolation being the soft pulse of blood that still, now, pumps. Without thought she presses her hand to the cut to stem the flow and calls with all the authority she can muster, “Someone fetch the maester. Cloths too. And a stretcher.”

The men move quickly to see to their tasks, leaving her alone with her husband, but for the one guard who holds the torch. She has to hold the wound carefully to keep it closed without squeezing too much on his throat. But though her hands quickly become slick and slippery with his blood, she feels him shift slightly. He breathes, is still alive, still breathing and when she looks down she sees his eyes are open. Green and open and watching her.

Just for a moment.

“Jaime,” she breathes, words barely above a whisper.

But his eyes flutter closed, and he is out once more. 

Perhaps it is for the best.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brienne guards her husband as he recovers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The response to chapter 1 has been humbling, and, dare I say it, a bit intimidating. I continue to have no idea what I'm doing. I just know I'm having a great time.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who helped with this chapter 🥰
> 
> Please feel free to come yell at me on my [tumblr](http://slipsthrufingers.tumblr.com). I occasionally post little snippets of upcoming parts of this, or the other WIPs I'm working on.
> 
> * * *

The maester arrives and surveys the gory scene with predictable dispassion. Brienne has never been fond of the man; there is something about him that doesn’t sit well with her, though she has never been able to pinpoint what it is precisely that rubs her so wrong. 

But he seems to approve of her hasty wound care, looking it over with a curt nod. He bids her to keep holding the wound and guides her thumb to a position less likely to press against her husband’s windpipe, then directs the men to free his arm and leg from where they are still shackled to the wall, so they can lift him onto the stretcher. 

“Maintain pressure on the wound as we move him,” Qyburn directs. “I should be able to do something for him once we’re in better light.” He casts his eye around the room, lingering some on the rather significant pool of blood creating a gruesome halo around her husband’s head. It has spread far enough that she is kneeling in the stuff. Another pair of breeches ruined by blood. Qyburn’s lips twitch. “Hopefully he has not lost _too_ much blood, else the effort might not be worth it.”

Something in her chest twists at that. She imagines, for a moment, that her hands are not so tenderly wrapped around _his_ neck instead of her husband’s. But she does not move. Cannot move. Not until the men lift the stretcher and she is forced to stand in unison with them. They step carefully, together, so they do not slip over in the slick puddles of blood.

The journey to the maester’s tower is arduous, seeming to take an age, forced as they are to walk slowly. Her husband does not wake a second time, not when he is jostled when they lift him, nor when the heavy metal gates to the dungeon are slammed shut behind them. It is only the subtle movements beneath her hands that signal to Brienne that he breathes. 

Despite everything he is still alive.

She is not a widow. 

Yet.

* * *

Qyburn has the soldiers lay him down on a bench in the middle of the room, then bids them leave him to his work. They obey, but Brienne still holds her husband’s life in her hands. _One flesh, one heart, one soul, now and forever_.

The maester stares at her when she lingers, at her hands still holding closed the wound. “You do not need to stay for this, my lady,” he says, without inflection.

“I want to,” she says. She feels a pulse beat beneath her fingers. Weak, true, but there. Still there. _One heart_. 

An expression flickers across his face, just for a moment. It is hard to say precisely what it is. Irritation, perhaps. Or exasperation. Both expressions she is intimately familiar with, having seen it on many faces in her life. But on him it is strange. A little twisted. But by the time she registers it, it is gone, and he has turned from her to collect the instruments he will need to sew his patient back together.

“Your sword will be of no use in here,” he says, still with his back to her, though his voice is mild and calm.

It only enhances her unease with the situation. Her sword remains sheathed at her waist, though she isn’t likely to draw it while she holds the wound closed. Why should he expect her to draw it? Is that all he thinks she is useful for? 

“Good then that I have no plans to wield it,” she says, and beneath her hands she feels Jaime move, however minutely, and she turns her gaze back on him. 

Even this close to death he is beautiful, almost ethereal, though his paleness speaks more to his blood loss than his innocence. She checks him for any other signs of consciousness, but his eyes stay closed and do not twitch beneath the lids. Some instinct has her leaning forward, making sure to keep her hands carefully still on his neck, until her mouth is by his ear. “You are safe, Jaime,” she breathes. 

He does not respond, and she is glad for it. The instant after the words leave her, she feels the tell-tale flush of embarrassment in her cheeks, though only Qyburn is there to witness it. And surely it is not wrong for her to offer him comfort. She is his… She is his wife, after all. Even if they have only ever spoken the words, never having played their respective parts in the eyes of gods _or_ men. Nor does she particularly want to.

But he is hers. And she is his. So she feels some kind of responsibility for him. And she knows, in her heart of hearts, that if their roles were reversed, and she was the one lying vulnerable on a bench, defenceless and exposed to the ghoulish whims of Qyburn, she would not want to be left alone.

“It will not be a pleasant sight,” Qyburn says, shocking her with his closeness. She has become distracted, and in that time the maester has gathered all he needs on a tray, which he sets down on the edge of the bench. Freshly sharpened blades that glint in the firelight, needles, twine, pressed white cloths and a flagon of boiled wine. A vial of a milky liquid.

“I’m _staying_ ,” she says for the last time.

Qyburn shrugs. “All right. If you insist on staying, then you shall be my assistant.”

 _One flesh, one heart, one soul. He is mine and I am his._ Her marriage vows echo in her mind as she does as she is bid, and works throughout the night and well past dawn to stitch her husband’s throat closed to save his life.

_From this day to the end of my days._

* * *

When it is done, when they have sewed his throat closed and dosed him with as much milk of the poppy as Qyburn declares safe, Brienne calls for men to help carry him from the tower so he can recover somewhere less dangerous than under the watchful eye of the maester. She considers the dungeon cell for only a moment, before writing that off as a ridiculous notion. It would need to be cleaned, and he _does_ need to be watched, in case he wakes and tries to remove the dressings.

There is nowhere else to take him but back to her room. The soldiers carry him down from the maester’s tower and through the halls, until they reach her room, the door still open from when she had left it hours before. However they halt in the hallway outside, and at first, in her sleepless confusion, she doesn’t understand why they have stopped.

But then she realises the cause.

Her rooms, while large and suitable enough for her means, are strangely designed. The door opens into another narrow corridor that runs parallel to the main hallway for several yards before it opens into the wide expanse of her room. Renly had described it as 'shaped like a battleaxe' when he had first visited her there, and it was the narrow entrance that meant she was granted the luxury of a private tub in her room. A servant had told her later that it had been such trouble to bring the tub in—many years previously for some important guest—that they had not bothered to try to remove it once they had departed. But that same narrow corridor is too tight, the angle of the doorway in relation to the wall too small which means that two men and a stretcher will be unable to fit through. Not without tipping the stretcher and dropping their charge to the floor.

“One of us could carry him, m’lady,” one of the guards offers, though his uncertain tone does little to fill her with confidence. It would be easy enough if Jaime was awake. Someone could slip his arm around their shoulder and guide him into the room and to the bed. But thanks to the milk of the poppy, her husband is not to be woken, and it presents quite a dilemma.

The other guard scoffs. “I can’t carry his weight by meself, and the way you kept moaning and groaning, I doubt you do it either, not without dropping him.”

“I’d have a better time of it than you, you fat ox,” the first guard says, clearly offended. He nods in the direction of his partner’s wide girth, sneering, “We’re on half rations and you have the gall to walk around looking like you’re about to birth a babe.”

The second guard puffs out his ample chest, “I’ll have you know I had to make two new holes in my belt last week.”

“Enough,” Brienne says, and perhaps she sounds more angry than she intends, because both men cease bickering immediately and turn to look at her. “I’ll carry him,” she says, and before either can object, she steps forward to do precisely that. 

She slips one arm beneath his knees, and another carefully behind his bony shoulder blades then she lifts, bearing his weight easily. His head lolls away from her for a moment, but she adjusts her grip on him and holds him tighter to her body. His head rocks back to wedge more closely in against her arm and while his arms dangle loosely down. It would be easier if he wrapped one or both of them around her neck, but she doesn’t need to carry him far. She steps forward through the doorway, manoeuvring carefully so that she doesn’t knock his head or feet against the wooden frame of the door or the dark stone walls of the corridor. To do so she has to walk sideways for a few steps, before she reaches the open space of her room. 

Her candles have burnt low in the night, but dawn light breaks through the tall window, and it is bright enough that she can see the obstacles in her way and so avoids them easily. The bed is rumpled, still unmade from when she had been awoken so abruptly, hours previously. She sets him down there, taking care not to jostle his head much, lest the stitches in his neck reopen. She turns to the guards who had followed her into the room. “Send for a maid,” she tells the first. “Tell them I need hot water, fresh sheets and something to eat.” To the second, she says, “Go tell Renly what happened, and that if he wishes to visit his prisoner, he is safe here in my custody.”

The guards leave quickly then, leaving her alone with her husband. Alone with him for the first time. He lies there in her bed, skinny and pale, and if it weren’t for the bandage about his throat perhaps he would look like he was sleeping peacefully. 

Sleeping off their wedding night. 

Brienne banishes the thought as soon as it comes, busying herself instead with removing her sword belt and scabbard, placing it on its usual hook beside her fireplace. There is a little water left in her basin from the previous night, and though it is icy cold it is enough that she can wash her face and hands. They are covered in dried blood—her clothes too, are soaked, and likely will need to be thrown away.

She checks that he still sleeps, a cursory glance over her shoulder, before she quickly strips off her soiled tunic and breeches, tossing them both into the corner. The maid will collect them when they take away her sheets. Standing there in her smallclothes, she quickly wipes away the rest of the blood—the blood that has stained her skin through the fabric—and changes into a fresh shirt and breeches.

It occurs to her then that she should have told the guard to bring fresh clothes for him as well. Her clothes might be salvaged with proper scrubbing, but there is no saving his. Even if they weren’t soaked through with blood, he has worn the same clothes for months, rotting in his own filth in his dungeon cell. They will need to be burned.

He sleeps, still, which is a small blessing. She doesn’t want to move him much, but finds amongst her things a small paring knife which she uses to carefully cut away the rotting, soiled clothes. 

She tries not to feel ashamed as she does it: it is for his own good, she tells herself. He is positively rancid, and she will not be able to stand him recuperating in _her_ bed for long if he smells so offensive. 

Still, it is hard not to feel that she is overstepping. If the roles were reversed, she would not want a man she barely knew to cut her clothes from her body. The thought of him waking while she uses the knife to cut away his threadbare breeches has her averting her gaze as she works. A risk, perhaps. But it is the only mannerly thing she can think to do.

By the time the maid arrives with the water, and fresh sheets and another with a tray of food fresh from the kitchens, she has hacked away his clothes and tossed them into the fire. He is still filthy, but she has drawn a sheet over him to protect his modesty. Perhaps to protect her own.

But she needn’t have worried. At least not about the opinions of the maids. “We could help you bathe him, milady,” the first one offers. She is an older woman, matronly and business-like, and for that Brienne is grateful. It helps to have someone else take charge, even if it is just for a little while.

Between the three of them they wipe him down carefully, with clean cloths dipped in the warm basin of water. It is nothing compared to a proper bath, in a tub with a scrubber and soap, but they clean away the worst of his filth, and when they are done they work together to prop him up and guide him into one of Brienne’s spare sleep shirts. All the while he doesn’t wake, completely dead to the world thanks to the milk of the poppy, and she chooses to see it as a blessing, rather than something to fret about. Better he sleep and rest now, than be awake for it all.

Finally, she carefully picks him up once more, holding him against her body like she would a sleeping child, while the two maids work quickly to strip the bed of the soiled sheets and remake it with fresh ones. Once they’re done, she sets him back down in the bed and covers him with the blankets before she dismisses her assistants with a grateful smile.

“If you need anything else, milady,” the younger maid says, dutiful but for the telling way her eyes dart back towards the bed, and the pretty blush that tints her cheeks.

Brienne is too tired to scold the girl, or blush herself. It has been a long night, fraught and frantic in turns, and she wants nothing more than to rest herself. She sees the maids to the door, and when they are gone she locks the door behind them.

Still, he sleeps on. Beautiful and broken and bound to her.

Her husband.

Brienne forces herself to eat a little—some bread and cheese—and drink a little—some spiced wine diluted with apple juice—before she yawns so wide her jaw cracks, and she cannot avoid sleep any longer.

She wishes she’d thought ahead, had ordered the guards to have a cot set up for her. But it is too late now, they are gone. And though the maids would likely be able to help, she has sent them away, too. It would feel too strange to call them back with another request so quickly.

She considers her other options.

There is a wooden chair at the table. It is barely large enough for her to sit in while she eats, let alone sleep in. She could grab a pillow from the bed, set it on the stone floor and sleep there; she has slept on the ground before, though it was the grassy floor of a meadow, or in a downy bed of leaf-litter on the forest floor. Not hard stone.

And Renly had given her this room because of the bed. The very large bed. Three men could easily sleep abreast an entire night without touching. Jaime lies prone on the right hand side, the side closest to the door. The window side remains empty. 

He is unlikely to wake for at least a day, the maester said. Perhaps more.

She only needs an hour’s rest. Maybe two.

She checks once more that her door is locked from the inside. That no one else will walk in, not even a maid seeing to her duties. And then, moving carefully, quietly, so as not to jostle the bed much, even though she’s unlikely to wake the other occupant, she draws back the covers and slips between the sheets.

Just an hour’s rest.

It’s all she needs.

Just an hour’s rest.

* * *

Her husband sleeps for days. It is what Qyburn said he would do, which helps put her mind at ease, somewhat. But against her best efforts, she worries.

Because it is not true sleep. He wakes occasionally, though to call it ‘waking’ is generous. His eyes open, but they are dull, like they do not see. And when she calls his name, softly, gently, it is as if he does not hear.

The first time she notices it, she helps him sit up, because he doesn’t seem to have the strength to do it himself, and helps him drink a little, and spoons a few mouthfuls of broth between his lips before he lists to the side, his eyes drifting shut again, and she has to catch him lest he fall out of the bed entirely. 

It happens again, a few hours later, but she is slow to notice and he has slipped back into unconsciousness before she can fetch some food to feed him.

After that she doesn’t stray far from his side. Just in case.

The fourth time he wakes, he accepts the food, and the water dosed with a little milk of the poppy. She tries calling his name again. He blinks, slowly, but drifts back to sleep just as quickly as the first time.

This goes on for some time. He spends most of his days unconscious, waking only briefly. Sometimes he can be roused, sometimes not. 

She can tell he is in pain. Once each day she changes the bandage about his neck and checks the wound. She sees no sign of festering, but still she worries. Many times she has seen a small cut on a hand or foot go bad, and she thinks it would be better if she killed him herself, rather than let him meet that end.

Sometimes she receives visitors. The maids come regularly, to bring her food and water, and to help her in her care. One of her men comes every morning, before the bell rings for first meal, and gives her a report: of the siege, of the morale of her men. The Tyrell army shows no sign of retreat, not that she’d expected it, but it is becoming hard to stay motivated, when there is no end in sight.

Lastly, he tells her that the fool is being kept isolated, chained and locked in a new cell; Renly still has not decided what to do with him, or with the man who still sleeps in her bed. She’d ask him herself, what he plans to do about the savagery, with his prisoner. Whether he will take any action.

But she doesn’t. She can’t.

Because Renly has not visited.

In truth, she had not expected him to. His hatred of the Lannisters runs deep, and likely would even if their allies weren’t stationed around Storm’s End, surrounding it on all sides but the ocean, which at this time of year, in the peak of storm season, is too treacherous for even an Iron Born sailor to navigate, let alone Randyll Tarley’s green captains.

Renly would not mourn Jaime if he died. Brienne knew that Renly and Jaime had squired together at Riverrun. Or was it Highgarden. She couldn’t remember much about it, in truth, except that they had been friends, once, as children, but their friendship had soured with the deaths of the elder Baratheons. Both poisoned. Dead at dinner, alongside Robert’s new wife, Jaime’s twin sister Cersei, leaving nothing behind them but the empty Iron Throne and two houses desperate to occupy it.

The years of war that had followed had destroyed houses, razed lands, killed countless, countless innocents.

She knew that her marriage was designed to force peace: the heir to Casterly Rock tied forever to a Stormland’s lady. East and West united. But frankly the specifics of it all were lost on her. She knew it to be the punishment it was designed to be. 

Brienne the Beauty. The joke. Only good for a political marriage, never for what she… It is what she was always meant for, she knows that true enough.

Still, she lies abed each night, next to her where her husband slumbers so deeply it is as if he does not dream.

She lies next to him.

And she dreams.

* * *

Brienne dreams of Tarth. Of her brother, alive and man-grown, the way he never was. Her sisters, too, and her mother. They all live. They all grow tall and strong and beautiful and she loves them all and they love her. They surround her in the warmth of their love. And in her dreams, she, too, is beautiful as they are. Men compete for her hand. They seek her father’s approval, and her brother’s, and they offer up many things: riches, lands, titles, in order to sway things in their favour.

But each and every one is turned away. “I will not sell my daughter off,” her father says to some nameless, faceless, handsome suitor. “If she is to marry, she will marry for love and only for love.”

One by one, men journey across the land to seek her hand. And one by one they are denied.

“My daughter will not marry, unless it is for love,” her father insists, though in the dream the sun is now setting. It casts the great hall of Evenfall castle in a glowing light. Her siblings, her mother, they all stand behind her father, but in this light, this reddish light, it looks as though… 

It is not the light. They are covered in blood. At each of their necks, there is a jagged gash that bleeds, dyeing them all red. 

Only their father is untouched.

But she can only watch when Galladon steps forward and grasps father’s forehead with one hand, pulling it back to expose his neck. He has a knife in his other hand.

“You must marry for love.”

It is the last thing her father says, before his throat is cut.

* * *

She wakes with a start, legs kicking out, fruitlessly tangled in the sheets, but she makes contact with something solid. Something fleshy. Someone.

“Ow!” a voice rasps, tired and angry and far far far too close.

It takes her a moment, too-long a moment, to shake off the haze of the nightmare and realise.

He is awake.

Her husband is awake.

Her husband is awake and looking at her.

She cannot scramble out of bed fast enough.

“You’re awake,” she says, dumbly, crossing her arms over her chest. A heat rises in her from somewhere in her core, spreading out through each of her limbs, lighting her face on fire.

“Are you sure?” he frowns, and he tries to sit up. Tries and fails—he has been abed almost a full week, and before that endured months of imprisonment in a small dungeon room. He is weak. He cannot lift himself.

She watches as the realisation of this colours his face. It is his turn to flush in shame. Or is it frustration? She’s never been good at reading faces.

An awkward silence spreads between them, with her standing beside the bed in her sleep shirt—and _just_ her sleep shirt—and he in _her_ clothes, unable to move.

They both begin to speak at once.

“I will fetch a—”

“Will you—”

“—maid to help you.”

“—help me up already, wife?”

Brienne has already turned away, to face the chair where she had tossed her breeches the night before, and so she is not privy to the look on his face when he asks for her help. She hears the resentment in his voice well enough, however, and it cures her of her embarrassment. The fire in her core sparks with anger of her own. An anger she had not now, until this very moment, realised brewed within her.

“You will not mock me,” she says, whirling back around on him. “I saved your life in that dungeon. I have kept you alive since then. I have not left this room in _days_. I have been a better wife to you than you deserve. I will _not_ be mocked.”

To his credit he does not flinch from her temper. He watches her from where he lies, his green eyes taking her in. She still cannot read his expression, but this time it is because his pretty face is blank and calm, devoid of anything, mockery and contrition alike. 

“I do not mock you,” he says, tiredly. He lifts his arms a little and holds them out to her. She can see how they shake, even at that simple movement. “I have been lying here awake for an hour or more while you slept on and I’m tired of seeing the world sideways.”

What an absurd thing to say. She steps back half a pace, clutching her breeches to her chest a little tighter. _Awake for an hour or more_ , he had said. That meant he had seen—

“I did not wish to fall asleep beside you,” she says quickly, though it is not what she means to say.

“No, I think not. Imagine falling asleep beside your husband in your own bed. What an impossibility.”

“I did not mean to _sleep_ ,” she says, hissing the last, just as frustrated with herself as she is with him. All these days and nights he has been insensible, unable to be roused, and the moment she lets her guard down and rests, she is haunted by dreams and him alike. It is too much. She will not bear it another moment.

She flicks out her trousers with a sharp snap of her wrists, then pulls them quickly up her legs—the only armour she has to hand at present. Of course her sword still lies beside the bed, not that she truly expects she will use it against the man. It would hardly be a fair match between them at present, when he cannot lift his head from the pillow. But it comforts her to see it there.

The look on his face leads her to expect he will say something cutting again in the absence of his sword. It is something about the way he watches her, eyes following her every movement, eyebrows arched and expressive. 

Perhaps they will wage war in this room. 

She is not equipped for this breed of warfare. His breed of warfare.

But when he speaks, the expected insult is not there. “How long have I been here?” he asks, eyes darting pointedly about the room. At once he takes in the high window, where the dawn light bleeds into the room, the fire which has burned to smoking embers in the night, and then the empty, high-backed bathtub tucked neatly into a corner. 

“Three days,” she says, then adds, despite herself, “You have woken once or twice, but never for long, and never this… this…”

“Lucid?” he supplies, voice oozing with sarcasm. 

“Awake,” she finishes. Blushing despite the forced confidence in her voice. 

He lets out a deep breath, hissed through his teeth and he turns his gaze to the vaulted stone ceiling. His mouth works for a moment or two, and his hands rub against the blankets before he turns to look at her again. When he speaks this time, the sardonic lilt is gone, replaced by something calm and polite and almost, _almost_ apologetic, “My lady, I would appreciate it if you would help me sit up as I’ve not the strength to do it by myself.”

Without her leave, her hands still where they had been buckling her belt tightly around her waist. It is though she is paralysed, fixed like some statue in the courtyard of the sept, or a deer that has heard the tread of a clumsy hunter in the forest. Despite her stillness, her heart pounds a staccato, painful rhythm in her chest. 

Because she could. She could lift him up. She had done it before, while he was still insensate from blood loss and milk of the poppy. She could do it now: help him sit, fluff some pillows behind his back. She _should_. It is what his wife ought to do, though she is only his wife in name, not in any of the other ways that matter. Nor will she ever be.

A memory comes to her then, of her mother, and her father. Brienne had been young, no older than four, because her mother was alive. She had stumbled into her parents’ chambers, upset at some slight, and wanting her mother desperately. That much was clear: her mother would fix it, though she could not remember what had caused her distress. 

But when Brienne had pushed the door open, she had been surprised to find both of her parents there. Her mother was bedridden, stomach swollen with Brienne’s twin sisters. Her father was there, perched on the edge of the bed, helping his wife to sit up. Holding her upright with one strong arm behind her shoulders, while he arranged and plumped the cushions behind her back so that she would be supported. As her father worked, concentration was writ clear across his brow, her mother smiled fondly, tilted her face upwards and kissed him on the cheek.

Brienne remembers her father’s laugh. That he had returned the kiss before both parents had turned to see to her wails.

She would have to hold her husband up in the same way. Hold him carefully, hold him close. Breathe the same air while she shifted the pillows to support him, take care not to hurt him. Treat him with care. Treat him as something precious.

He could lean forward, too. Tilt his face upwards, and...

No. She can’t. She _can’t_. 

She was not made to be a wife.

It is this thought that forces her to action. Brienne picks up her sword and holds the scabbard tightly in her hands. Its weight is familiar and grounding. It helps bring her back to herself.

“I will send a maid,” she says, looking carefully at the stone wall behind his head, avoiding his gaze.

Because for all she cannot read faces, she knows what she will see on his face if she looks.

She will see a man sneering with disappointment. A man disappointed and angry and bitter that he has been chained to such a wife. An ugly, brutish, craven wife.

So she doesn’t look. She leaves the room as quickly as she can, before he can say anything to stop her.

* * *

“We do not have the room,” Renly says dismissively. “Either we put him back in the dungeons, or he can convalesce in Qyburn’s rooms.”

“No,” she says, too quickly.

Renly turns to his squire, who is fiddling with one of the latches on his breastplate “That one needs to be tighter, boy.”

“Yes milord,” the squire squeaks, and does as he is bid. Once upon a time that had been Brienne’s task to perform, and she had been happy to do it. Just as she is happy that it is her job no longer.

“Then he must stay in with you,” Renly says. She wants to scream, but doesn’t. She would never. Her face remains impassive and still, she is sure. Not a twitch of a muscle. Not that Renly would have noticed if she had. He is looking over his reflection in the floor-length mirror in his chambers, inspecting his armour for flaws. “Though I suppose you could give up your room to him, and _you_ could sleep in the dungeon in his place. Then I would not have to bother finding more competent guards to replace the useless cads that let this whole thing happen in the first place.”

He smiles at her, like they are sharing some clever joke.

 _But you were the one who gave them their orders_. Brienne smiles back, but it is forced and she cannot hold it in place. It drops from her face more quickly than she means it to. To cover this, she turns to the tray beside her and pours herself a small glass of wine so that she can better hide her face from him. She does not particularly want a drink, but the first sip is warm and steadying, so she takes another. Perhaps it is what she’d needed all along.

“He will ask me about his brother,” she says, warming the goblet between her palms. 

Renly’s reflection catches her gaze. “And you will lie, as we agreed.” 

She flushes though she cannot blame the wine. “I have no talent for lying.”

“And I have no talent for sword-play, and yet I practise every day so that I might get better.” There is a sharpness to his words that takes her by surprise, though it has been in his voice more and more since the deaths of his brothers. Her lively friend, always so ready to joke and laugh, had been replaced with this rough, unpleasant copy before her very eyes. It had happened so slowly that she had not noticed at the time. She does not know how to talk to this Renly, who looks so much like her friend, but has nothing of his warmth.

“He will know something is wrong,” she insists. “What if he asks to see him?”

“Say that we have moved him to Dragonstone. Say that Davos hid him below deck and sailed away with him after he delivered the last batch of provisions.”

It was near enough to the truth; perhaps it might hold him over, for a while. But she is still unsure. Her husband had been easy enough to manage while he slept, when all she had to do was change his dressings. And before that, when she could almost ignore his existence at all, hidden away as he was in his dungeon cell.

But he is there no longer, and he is awake. Awake and clear headed, with a brightness about his eyes, even in sickness, that speaks of his intelligence. She will not be able to pull the wool over his eyes for long, if she can manage it at all. He will discover, one way or another, that Tyrion is not here. That, in truth, Renly never had the boy. That he was forced to marry her under false pretenses. 

Perhaps their marriage will bring the realm peace, at least on paper. 

But there will be no peace for her.

* * *


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay on this one. I paused to work on my exchange fic, and then, you know, life happened. Hopefully the next update will not be so long coming!

* * *

In the days after her husband wakes, properly, as he recovers from his wound, Brienne avoids her room. She still returns there at night to wash behind the screen, change into fresh clothes and sleep in the cot she had brought up from the main barracks. Most nights when she returns he is already asleep, just as she’d hoped.

There is no need for her there, now that he is awake. She has the maids attend his needs, and they report to her that he is polite and courteous and grateful for their help, though perhaps a little ornery at times, as any patient can be. They are forgiving enough of that, though, as with his returning health comes the return of his looks. Now that they are no longer obscured beneath months of caked on filth, and he has gained back some of the weight he had lost, he is quite something to behold. Even Brienne finds it difficult to look away from him. Though she only ever sees him sleeping, lit by thready moonlight, she must force her gaze elsewhere, back to something grounded in reality—her rough hands, the reflection of her mismatched face in the looking glass—else she forget what it is she must do before she rests.

Because she is tired. No. Exhausted. The siege still has not broken. Each day the Tyrell army sends forth their negotiator, and each day Renly turns them away, refusing to hear their terms.

So she guards the walls. She inspects the soldiers. She checks their food stores, spending hour upon hour with the castellan tallying sacks of grain and barrels of ale until she can barely see, let alone read any more. It is all she can do to crawl beneath the covers of her bed before it is as if she must wake again to start it all over again.

It can’t last.

It doesn’t last.

Brienne returns one night from another shift atop the wall. The Tyrells had mounted another fruitless assault and once more had been rebuffed, but it was getting harder and harder every time. Tonight she’d lost one of her men—one of the younger boys, still a little green, but always eager to learn—when a Tyrell arrow had found its target. It had been a quick death, hopefully painless, but pointless nonetheless. For in truth, the reason it was getting harder and harder to keep her head in the fight was because _she_ was finding it harder to reach for reasons to fight. So many times they had thought there would be a truce, that they would finally find some common ground, only to find it broken within days. Her own marriage, as preposterous as it was, had been one of the many schemes, and look how that had worked out for her. 

She unbuckles her sword belt and hangs it on a hook outside the door, before she finally unlocks the door, steps inside, and turns to lock it behind her. She moves by rote, like a puppet controlled by some god, going through the motions without truly thinking.

So it is a little while, too long, before she notices she is not alone. Or at least not the only one awake.

Her husband is perched on the edge of the bed, watching her quietly as she unlaces the front of her gambeson. Her fingers freeze mid tug; her heart skips a beat.

“Good evening, wife,” he says. He is not smiling, but there is something light in his voice she does not like. It reminds her of the fresh breath of air before a devastating storm. The gods drawing in a deep breath, so they can blow a gale that rips the roofs from houses, or topples ancient trees in the forest.

“Good evening,” she says back, not sure what else to say. 

It is the first good look at him she has had all week, and she is surprised to see how much he has improved. His skin is no longer grey and clammy, but tinted with a healthy pink flush. His hair, now clean, is impossibly golden in the candlelight, and though the wound on his neck is still bound, he seems to have no problem holding himself upright. It feels like she is meeting him properly for the first time. There is no denying his beauty, nor the intelligence behind his eyes. If someone had told her, a year ago, five years ago, that she would be married to this man she would have laughed until she cried. What an absurd joke.

But of course there is nothing funny now.

He is still watching her, eyes not leaving her face, likely noting every emotion that flickers across her face. An open book to his inscrutable facade.

“Did we repel the attack?” he asks, tilting his head just so.

“How did you know we were attacked?” she asked in return, suspicion flaring in her belly.

He juts a thumb over his shoulder at the window. “I watched. If I was quiet, I could hear.”

“Oh.” She nods faintly. She had forgotten. Of course. She was so tired. A yawn crackles in her throat, but she sniffs in deeply to swallow it, then returns to the task of unlacing the gambeson. It smells of fire and blood and it will not do to sleep in it. Sure, he is awake, and he is watching her every movement, but it is not like she is stripping out of all her clothes—she has her tunic on underneath, though it too will need changing before she sleeps. 

“So did we?” He shifts on the bed, and for a moment she fears he will stand and approach her, but instead he shuffles a little to the side. A strangely nervous, fidgety movement. She does not know what to make of it.

“Yes,” she says, finally divesting herself of the leather outer-layer. She hangs it up on the back of one of the chairs tucked up against the wall to make room for her cot. “It wasn’t a serious attempt to breach the wall. We repelled them easily enough.”

Brienne is aware, all the while, that he is watching her. There is a pregnant quality to the silence between them; they are both waiting for something. What, she isn’t sure. She is too tired to think on it overmuch.

“But you were hurt,” he says, after some time. 

“I wasn’t,” she says gruffly, too tired to keep the affronted tone from her voice, and it is outrageous enough to get her to look at him directly, to see why he would accuse her so. She is so sick of men trying to tear her down this way, say she is injured, when she is just tired. When they say that it is because she is a woman that she expresses concern for the wellbeing of her men, rather than her responsibility as their commander. She is sick of—

“There is blood.” He points at her side, face remaining devoid of expression. She glances down to see he speaks true. Her tunic is dirty with more than sweat and grime. It sticks to her side, tacky and stained red with blood.

The wound barely sparks a response. She knows she should feel something at the sight of it, shock, pain, embarrassment, anything, but all she truly feels is weary. One more thing she will have to attend to before she can sleep. One more problem to solve.

She twists a little to see it better, plucks the fabric away from her skin and in doing so finds a tear through which she sees an equivalent tear in the flesh of her side. An arrow wound, perhaps. It oozes blood slowly, yet it does not seem to hurt. 

“I could help you,” he offers, though he stays seated. 

“No. It’s fine.” 

It comes out quickly, before she can consider the proposition too closely, and she retreats behind the panelled screen to rid herself of the rest of her clothes. There is a basin there, filled with water and a stack of clean cloths. The bathtub is there too, though it remains empty; it is too much trouble to have it filled, no matter how soothing the hot water would be for her tired bones. 

Before she does anything else, she listens carefully for any signs of movement from her husband, but he stays still enough for her to hear the crackle and snap of logs in the fire. Appeased for now, she removes her trousers slowly, pushing them over her hips and down her legs so she doesn’t exacerbate the wound, though she leaves her smallclothes in place. She checks again for any tell-tale sound, wishing the panel was one of the decorative kinds she has seen, with looping, decorative carvings at eye-height that would allow her to properly watch for untoward movement. 

When she is certain he is still sitting where she’d left him, perched on the edge of her bed, she pulls her soiled tunic over her head. Her heart pounds in her chest, knowing he is only steps away from her while she is so vulnerable, without so much as a butter knife in the room lest he find a way to use it now that he is conscious. But her fear is more than that and less. As unwise as it is, she does not truly think he is a danger to her. Even if he were well, which he still is not, she is sure he would not mean her harm. She is not worried on that account, that he means to do her harm. No… It is not that that frightens her.

It is something far worse.

She is just acutely aware that she is naked, or near enough, and that there is nothing but the thin screen separating them. He might not be well enough to hurt her, to overpower her in a fight, but he is surely well enough to walk a few paces across the room to look on her as she is. Bare and injured and tired and afraid, yes. Afraid. Afraid of what he might say.

For a moment or more she is struck still by the thought, transported into her worst memories and haunted by the words of odious men, words that hinted at a truth they could never know. It is some time before she realises she still holds the tunic tightly in her hands and she consciously releases it from her grip and drapes it over the screen. Makes sure to move slowly and precisely in hope that it will calm her racing heart.

Brienne focusses on the practical instead. Inspects the wound as best she can. It is not a mortal wound, but it is long, slicing almost the length of her thick waist. The skin is cut deepest at the front, where the arrow most likely entered and glanced off, but she doesn’t think it will need to be sewed closed, though it will certainly need cleaning. She wets one of the cloths and cleans the skin around the wound first, wiping away the grime and sweat of her fight along with the blood. When she gets to the wound itself she wets a fresh cloth and grips the edge of the bathtub in preparation against the pain. 

It does hurt, more than she expects, and she’s exhausted and exposed and she cannot swallow the gasp and the little grunt at the shock of it all. Her eyes prickle with tears, which threaten to spill past the dam of her eyelids when she hears the rustle of his movement on the other side of the screen.

“Are you all right?” he calls. There is a hesitation there, a wariness.

“No—” she calls, meaning to tell him to stay where he is, instructing him not to come any closer, but then she realises what she’d said and presses the cloth a little harder against the wound, the pain of it whiting out her vision. “I mean yes. Don’t—”

But he is already there. 

She flails wildly for the dirty tunic where it hangs across the partition, snatches it up and holds it against her chest to preserve what little modesty she can. “Leave!” she shouts.

He steps forward instead. “You have seen me in less, wife, and I did not protest so.”

The word _wife_ rings in her ears like a bell. One of the giant ones that hung in the Sept of Baelor, just as tall as her and loud enough to be heard from the Red Keep to Fleabottom. It deafens her to anything else, even the pounding of her own heart. 

“That was different,” she says, hunching over herself despite the now almost excruciating pain in her side.

“Because I was unconscious?” She can hear the sceptical arch of his brow and she hates it. 

There is no way to answer that, not truly, and it is almost as painful as the wound, that she is so easily bested in this kind of combat. And she is scared. It is a pathetic thing to admit to herself, but there is no other name she can give to the gooseflesh prickling along the line of her spine or the way her mouth has dried up. She knows it’s ridiculous and impossible, but her heart is certainly beating as loud as any war drum, a staccato, shocking thing that Jaime must hear because he is close, so close; worse still, a wave of nausea roils up from her bowel, clenching and tightening and rendering her weak and dizzy and tired.

“Please leave,” she gasps and grasps at the partition with her free hand, in hope that it would be steadying, grounding. But it wobbles unsteadily when she puts too much of her weight on it; it is designed to obscure things from view, only. It is no shield.

He says nothing, and for a moment the silence stretches between them, expectant and thunderous, like her still-beating heart.

But then she hears the soft pad of his socks against the stone floor. A retreat. A reprieve.

She quickly turns her head to check he has truly gone, and he has. All she can see is the stone wall on the opposite side of the room. Still untrusting, she turns her ear to listen for any other sign, but she can hear nothing else but the soft crackle of the fire. 

Brienne draws in a deep breath, or as deep as she can without angering the fresh wound, and lets it out slowly so that it might calm her. It works a little, enough that she can find the resolve to drop the tunic to the floor and resume cleaning her wound. It hurts, but not as much, and she finds that it is easier to grit her teeth against the pain, now, though she does not examine why.

Cleaning the wound hurts, a blinding pain at first, but it quickly dissolves into a satisfying sting and it has mostly stopped bleeding. Probably she should dab at it with some boiled wine to prevent infection, and dress it with a clean bandage so that she won’t soil her bedsheets in the night, but both are rationed within the castle, and she’ll live without either for the time being. 

Once she finishes tending to the gash, she turns her attention to the rest of her body. There is a little looking glass hanging from a hook in the wall, though she does not need it to know her face is filthy with smoke and blood and grime from the skirmish on the walls.

She washes her face with the last of the water. It is bracingly cold, and trickles down her neck and chest, a dirty, sooty rivulet in the vast valley between her breasts, little as they are. She wipes the excess water away with the last of the drying cloths, and is only then that she realises she’s made a grave mistake. In her weariness, she’d forgotten to fetch a change of clothes from her trunk; it had become her habit in the days that Jaime had spent asleep. Whether she had the bath filled, or simply washed herself with a cloth as she had just done, she took her sleep tunic with her behind the screen. But all she had now was the soiled, bloody tunic and trousers that still lay on the floor where she had dropped them as she’d stripped. And she had not had the luxury of a bath robe since she’d left her island home.

The problem has her paralysed for far too long. A week ago this would not have been an issue. She would have strode out from behind the partition to fetch something clean without a second thought. But she cannot do that any more than she can don the filthy clothes she’d removed. A little voice, a craven, mean thing that reminds her too much of her septa whispers in her ear. _You must call for your husband to assist you_ , it says, causing something deep inside her to clench tightly with terror. _It is what a husband does for his wife._

Brienne closes her eyes against the voice, though she knows it’s fruitless. That voice has haunted her for years, and will likely do so for many more to come. It haunts her because it is right, more often than not.

But before she can open her mouth, let alone form the words, a strange sound distracts her. A soft thunk above her, gentle and hollow and only audible because the rest of the room is almost as silent as the grave. She looks up to see a clean night shirt draped over the lip of the partition.

She hadn’t asked, but he had brought it to her anyway.

There is no doubting who tossed it there; she can only wonder that he had moved so silently she hadn’t noticed. But she is not in a position to object to him going through her things. Carefully, she reaches up and pulls the garment down, being careful so that it does not snag on the ornate curling carving at the top. It feels almost like armour, once she has slipped her arms into the sleeves tugged it over her head—though it surely feels like better protection against harm than any chain or plate she has ever donned.

It gives her the strength to move out from behind the screen. She takes a deep breath and takes a few steps forward, expecting to see him only feet away, hovering close by. But at first she does not see him. He does not stand, and he is not in the bed, either. For half a heartbeat she panics, that he has somehow, against all reason and logic, found some way to silently escape her room in the minute it took for her to dress.

But then she sees him.

He is not in his bed, but hers. The camp cot that she had had brought to the room so that she would not have to sleep beside him now that he was conscious. The uncomfortable thing, at once too short and too narrow for her bulk, that she had shoved up against the wall furthest from the luxuriously large bed.

He has curled up in it, facing the wall underneath the threadbare blankets she’d managed to scavenge from a storeroom. His eyes are closed, but he surely isn’t sleeping. Could not be sleeping, not yet. Not without sweet sleep, and Qyburn had weaned him off it a week ago.

Nevertheless, the message her husband sends is clear enough.

She douses the candle. The dying fire gives off enough light for her to make her way to her own bed without incident. She slips beneath the covers of her own bed, and tries not to notice that her pillow smells different.

* * *

Brienne sleeps the night through, relishing the comfort of the bed after weeks in the uncomfortable cot, where, given her size, her feet had always dangled off the end. And if that is not miracle enough, it is a dreamless night of sleep for the first time, since, well… But the true blessing, better than all the rest, is that when she wakes, she wakes before he does.

There is light enough in the room, though the sun has only barely peeked across the horizon, but it is enough for her to roll over, careful both of her wound—which she checks and is relieved to find seems free of any signs of infection—and the noise the sheets might make. But he is sound asleep, curled up uncomfortably just as she usually is—failing, just as she does, to fit his whole body on the cot. His feet hang off the end, uncovered by the blanket. He wears a pair of her socks, recogniseable by the hole through which his big toe pokes.

As quietly as she can, she pushes back the covers and levers herself out of bed. The cold stone on her bare feet is a shock. She had not thought to put socks back on before she slept, nor would she have been able to bend over to pull them on, with the wound on her side as fresh as it is. The flinch is instinctive, and cannot be stopped, but she manages to swallow her gasp, lest it be enough to wake him.

But he doesn’t stir.

She watches him for perhaps a second longer than she should. He is truly beautiful. In this light his skin softly glows, and the curls that frame his face are as golden as his sigil. Even from where she is on the bed, she can see the delicate flutter of his eyelashes, that remind her of fragile things: a butterfly’s wings, a flower petal.

Gods. _A butterfly’s wings?_ Perhaps her wound _had_ turned putrid. Why else would she think such a ridiculous thing as that?

With renewed effort, she pushes herself from the bed to stand, and is happy to find she can hold her weight, that the pain she had endured last night is far less now that she is not exhausted. As quickly as she can without causing any undue noise, she gathers her clothes for the day: a fresh tunic, trousers, her boots and a clean pair of socks, hopefully hole-free, and shuffles to the door. The guard on the other side unlocks it quickly when she knocks; if it is noise enough to wake him, she couldn’t say. She has already slipped through the small gap in the door, and the guard, well-practiced at this routine by now, shuts and locks it behind her at once.

Brienne takes a moment to catch her breath, for that little deception, as quiet and low-stakes as it could be, has set her heart racing. But before she can calm it properly, she notices the guard watching her. His eyebrow is raised, clearly taking note of her state of undress; usually she would dress in her room, behind the partition she had taken refuge behind the previous night. 

He opens his mouth, the question on his lips sure to be delivered with the usual sneer and mockery, but she is not in the mood for it. So she stands a little taller and pulls her shoulders down away from her ears, easily towering over the guard. Plants her feet firmly and squarely to face him. Reminding him that she is his superior, in rank as well as ability, and that if he crossed her here, she would make him regret it should he ever cross swords with her later.

It works. Brienne can see him swallow the question when he averts his gaze, and she uses the opportunity to dress quickly, though still carefully, to avoid agitating the wound at her side. It still bleeds, some, though not as much as the previous night. She will have to find Qyburn before she meets Renly in his solar. It will not do to bleed all over his new Tyroshi carpet.

Soon enough she is dressed, and the guard fetches her sword and scabbard from where they hang on a hook behind him. She takes it without thanking him, buckling it lower on her hips than she usually prefers so it doesn’t press or rub against the still-tender skin, and stalks off towards the high tower to find the disgraced maester.

* * *

In the week that follows, Brienne is determined to act as though that night had not happened. She wants nothing more than to return to the comfortable truce they had somehow found while he recovered from his wound.

But just like the other things that she has wanted in life, she finds herself disappointed. Or not disappointed. Frustrated. Yes. She is frustrated. _He_ is frustrating.

At first it is just the bed. The first night that he took her place in the cot was perhaps a kindness, but Brienne does not know what to make of the fact that he retreats there each night after, pointedly, noisily, so that she is left with no other option but to sleep in her own bed. She can hardly complain, and she doesn’t. But she finds it odd.

Then it is her clothes. She has never had much in the way of things to wear, even when she still lived at Evenfall, and she has been content to live out of her small trunk while here in Storm’s End. On some level, she is aware that he must have gone through her things at some point. His recovery has continued on remarkably, and if she were in his place she would have searched the room for anything that might help her escape, which is why she had removed everything _but_ her clothes as soon as Qyburn had told her there was nowhere else for him to recuperate.

She is confronted with the certainty of his actions when she returns one night to find Jaime sitting cross-legged on his cot. He holds one of her tunics up to the light, inspecting a rather sizeable tear along the shoulder-seam. 

But that is not what gives her pause.

It is that he is sitting on her cot, inspecting one of her torn shirts, while wearing the only dress she has in her possession. A plain grey thing Renly had given her moons ago, that she’d never worn and he’d never asked about. She doesn’t think she’d even tried it on, but even if she had, she surely wouldn’t have worn it so well as him. His too-long curls framing his face and curling against the high neckline in a very pretty way. 

Instead of shocking her, it reminds her of a memory of her mother she thought she’d forgotten. In the memory her mother is pregnant, so Brienne must have been very little, perhaps three or four years old, but she remembers asking why she liked to mend things herself, rather than give the task to a maid or septa. 

“It is what my mother did for me, my little starfish,” she had said, holding out a blue dress that Brienne recognised as one of her own that she had ripped a day or two before while playing with her brother. “She used to tell me that every mended tear, every repaired seam was a chance for her to show how much she loved me, and my sisters. My father too. Every stitch was bound with a bit of her love, and that is what I am doing for you too.”

But her mother is long dead and her husband will never love her the way her mother loved her father. And it certainly doesn’t explain why he was wearing her only dress.

“If you bring me a needle and thread, I can fix this for you,” he says, without greeting. 

At first she doesn’t know how to respond. He’s so clearly trying to get a reaction from her.

“Why are you—”

“Wearing this? Because it is the only clean thing you have that isn’t ripped, and no one has seen fit to bring me my own clothes. I guess it is lucky we are of a size, else you might have found me here in much less than this.” He sets the tunic to the side and gestures to the dress he wears. It is not properly laced, she can see now; it is the type that needs a maid to help with the laces, which is partly why she herself has never worn it. Or at least it is the reason she’d give, were Renly to ever ask after it. 

Thank the gods he hasn’t. He might have insisted she wear it to her wedding.

“I’m sorry,” she says evenly, in lieu of any more expressive response. “I should have thought to find you something to wear.”

He shakes his head. “No need. I am quite happy with what I’ve found here, and I’ve little else to do in here all day when you leave and lock me in. I might as well be the good wife and do my mending.”

The words twist in her stomach better than any knife. It leaves her mouth dry and her fingers twitching to grasp the pommel of her sword, but it is hanging on its hook outside her bedroom door. She has heard the words before, or their like. _You make a better man than most men_ , her old swordsmaster had said to her once. He had meant it to be a compliment, and she had been able to hide her hurt better, knowing as much. But it had been harder to hide her hurt when she heard the words of others— _I know why she wears trousers! She’s either a man with the world’s smallest cock or she’s a woman. If she wore a skirt you’d never know for sure!._

“You’re not my wife,” she says, the protest more quiet than she wants it to be, but he seems to have stolen the breath from her lungs. It is a fight she is not prepared to fight; he has thoroughly bested her, and all it took was a change of clothes and a well-placed taunt. But he is not content in his victory; he wants to dig the knife in further.

“Not from where I stand,” he says, and stands, then takes a step towards her, while he begins to count a list on his fingers. “I am kept locked in a tower, alone, with only you to talk to, while you go out and defend the castle from an invading army. I am to be seen, but not heard, just like a good wife, or so I have been told many times—”

“That’s no—”

“And then there is the fact of the marriage itself. Tarth was once one of the great houses in the Stormlands, I am told. But here you are, the last of them. Impoverished and alone and fighting a battle you cannot possibly hope to win, because you love a man who will never love you back.” He steps closer again, now within a swinging sword’s distance. She is defenceless. How does he know these things? Has he been speaking to one of the guards, or is it all writ clear upon her face, there to read by anyone who would take the time to learn the words her blush and eyebrows formed.

He takes another step forward. She is frozen in place, wanting to look anywhere but at him, and unable to do anything else. She is his prey. If she looks away, he will pounce. Tear her to shreds.

“It was the smart thing to do, marrying me. You stand to inherit my wealth, after all. Wives have killed their husbands for less than what I bring to this marriage in dowry. Not to mention any legitimate child of mine stands to inherit the throne, should my father win this war… Your father will finally get his wish, that Tarth will be saved from ruin.”

The words cut her deep. Deeper than any arrow wound. It was all her father had worried about, in the years before he’d died. What he had done to cause the downfall of their house. What he should have done differently. His regret that he had not remarried, and that he had never fathered more children when all but she had died. She had tried and failed too many times to do what she could to salvage their legacy, and he had been too good to blame her, shouldering the blame himself.

But how could her husband know that? The war between the Baratheons and the Lannisters had been waging for years when she received word of her father’s passing, and Evenfall was no great house. It’s downfall would likely not be newsworthy to anyone outside of the Stormlands…

It is then she sees the letters.

Her letters. Sitting on the cot, half buried by her torn tunic.

The letters her father had sent her when she had joined Renly’s forces. The ones she received before he died. They had been bound together with twine, and buried at the bottom of her trunk. If he’d scrounged deep enough to retrieve the dress, then it was no surprise he’d found the letters too. And he had clearly read them. And he had used what he had found within them to hurt her.

She looks back up at him to see his face shift. There is an ugly expression there, now, one she has not seen on his face before. 

“You read my letters.” The words feel like steel between her lips, sharp and full of deadly promise. Her sword might be behind stone walls and a locked door, but she has her hands, and she has her teeth.

“Where is my brother?” Jaime replies, equally sharp, equally deadly.

“You had no right—”

“Is he dead?” he says, and takes another step forward, the skirts of her dress he wears brush against her dirty boots. He looks her in the eye and she cannot turn away. “Is he dead?” he repeats, but this time she can hear the waver in his voice. The hurt, the fear.

"No," she says, like she knows. It might be true, and she hopes it is. But she can't tell him the truth. It would only make everything worse. "He's alive. But he was moved from the castle when you were captured."

It's almost the truth. In a certain light it is. Tyrion is no longer in the castle. Hadn't been the whole time Jaime had been imprisoned.

Jaime eyes narrow. She has never been good at deception and she is sure he will see straight through her paltry attempt at it. The battle she'd always lose, the only one that mattered. Betrayed by her open face.

It is all she can do to keep her composure and hold his gaze. She desperately wants to look away, but she can't, locked in place by his piercing green eyes. He has already seen too much of her. Knows too many of her secrets. What hope does she have of keeping this one?

But he blinks. Steps back. Turns his face away from hers and with a swish of skirts returns to the bed where he bends over and gathers together her father's letters. The last tether she has to him, will ever have to him. Brienne is acutely aware of the roaring fire burning in the hearth between them. It would be the work of a moment to toss the letters into the flames, where they would be destroyed before she could so much as lift a muscle. And he is hurt and scared enough she wouldn't blame him if he were to lash out, like any caged animal would.

He doesn't, though. Instead he holds the papers out to her. She reaches out to take them but as she does he tightens his grip on them. A tug of war.

"Your father seemed like a good man. Honourable. I can tell from his letters that he clearly loved you. As I love my brother," her husband says, the letters scrunching a little as he uses her grip on them to pull her closer. There is less than a foot between them now. "What would your father say if he could see you now? Would he be proud, do you think?"

It is a wound, inflicted with precision and speed, and one she had no hope of protecting herself against. 

Her only option is to strike back. Hurt him as he had hurt her.

But she can’t. She doesn’t want to, nor is she equipped with wit to wield and do so.

“It wouldn’t be the first time I disappointed him, even in death,” Brienne says finally, tugging her letters free. Quickly, she checks they’re all there, that he hasn’t squirrelled any away, but though they’re a little crumpled, there aren’t any missing. She grasps them tightly against her chest. “He always said he hoped I’d marry someone for love, as he did. But I married you.”

The words roll off her tongue before she can think them through, though they are honest enough. But perhaps that is why they work. He does not flinch or step back; there is no flash of hurt in his eyes. Yet there is a hardening there, a tenseness in the line of muscle in his neck, in the creases around his lips.

The blow hits true.

Perhaps she isn’t as weaponless as she thought.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am attempting NaNoWriMo this month for a new project, but I'm using my WIPs as procrastination, so while finishing this fic and She's Beauty are not my direct goal at the moment, I am trying to trick my procrastination into finishing _something_ and hopefully you all will benefit. That being said there are one or two chapters left in this at best. Thank you for being patient with me while I work on them (and She's Beauty), and also to those very patient people who helped with this chapter. You're the best ❤️

* * *

When Brienne leaves her bedroom behind, clutching nothing but her father’s letters and the remains of her dignity, she makes a beeline to the barracks. The ranks have thinned some, and now the barracks have empty cots aplenty for her to choose from. She selects one long-abandoned on the far end of the room, the end furthest from the hearth. It still has a thin pillow and blanket, which she makes do with, though they will not be enough if the weather continues to turn. Better to be cold than to be trapped in her room with _him_ any longer.

She sleeps there three nights, and would’ve stayed longer--the length of the rest of the war--if it weren’t for the snide comments she overhears from some of the men. It's times like this she knows, for all her bravado with a sword in her hand, she is not truly brave. A brave person would confront them when she hears them jeer about 'a spat with her lord and master', when they suggest the things she should do as his wife to beg for his forgiveness. A brave person would stand up for herself, defend her name.

No. She is not brave. Because if she were brave she would be sleeping in her own bed, instead of a smelly camp cot, listening to the farts and snores of odious soldiers, stuck in a months long siege, fighting a war they'll likely never win.

With shame flushing her cheeks, she finds somewhere else to sleep the following night.

* * *

In the week that follows, Brienne sleeps in increasingly uncomfortable places. The library, a loft in the stables, on a bench in the great hall and once, a frigid night on the stone floor of a hallway outside of the kitchens.

Still, she would have persevered through the discomfort, but in her haste to quit her room before she embarrassed herself any further, she had neglected to grab a change of clothes. For a little while it is not a problem; in a stroke of luck the Tyrell forces have not mounted a true attack on the castle in days. Her shifts on the walls are simple patrols and her armour keeps away most of the grime. But when she wakes, exhausted, to a telling cramping in her lower belly, she knows she cannot avoid the room any longer. 

She wishes it were night, instead of the cold light of morning. If it were night, and she were quiet, she could perhaps sneak in to the room, fetch what she needs from her trunk, and sneak out, all without being noticed. But the gods are cruel, they always have been, and the moment she steps inside the room, after commanding the guard to unlock the door, she can tell Jaime is already awake.

It is something about the atmosphere in the room; the quality of the silence is different when he is awake. Her boots sound impossibly loud as she walks down the little corridor to see that yes, he is awake, sitting carefully on the edge of the bed. He's not wearing her dress anymore, has returned to wearing her breeches and one of her blue tunics. The dress is hung up neatly over the partition that hides the tub.

Jaime's cheeks are flushed, and his eyes are wide and red-rimmed. If it weren't for the dark puffy circles beneath them, she would think he'd been crying.

"You're back," he says quickly, his voice sounding husky in a way that has her worry he is sick.

"Yes," she says, scanning her eyes over him for any other signs of illness. He may have hurt her feelings, but he is still her responsibility. If he were to die in her care, such as it is, she would feel guilty. Worse, she'd have to explain to Renly she let their most valuable prisoner die of a cold.

As far as she can tell he doesn't seem sick, just tired. Perhaps he has slept as badly as her, these last few nights. She doesn’t want to think on it any longer than she has to. She has spent more than enough time caring for him, more than he probably deserves, and she is not in the mood for it now.

Instead she sets aside her things, stripping off her belt and sword, which she hangs on the back of her chair, and then her gambeson, which smells truly putrid after she has worn it a full week without washing. But since she is in the room now for _other_ reasons, she might as well wash up--will probably have to, if the dampness at the crux of her thighs is any indication.

“Where have you been?’ he asks. He is behind her, closer than she’d expected, but when she glances over her shoulder at him he looks anything but threatening. His hands grasp the air at his sides, and his eyes roam over her almost manically, checking, searching, every inch of her he can see. She wonders what she looks like, what he sees.

“I have had things to do,” she says, turning now to her trunk of things. She keeps her belt and cloths in a small bag which often finds its way to the bottom of the trunk, but in the week she’s been away from her room he has rearranged her possessions. Or rather, he has done away with her possessions, because other than her letters, which are tucked safely beneath her tunic, and a few other trinkets that rattle at the bottom of the trunk, all her things are missing. 

No. Just her clothes. 

Her clothes are missing.

“For a whole week?” he asks, and there is a fragility there that takes her by surprise. She turns back to look at him, arching an eyebrow. At her look he blanches, seems to realise the tone he’d used and all that it betrayed. She watches his throat as it bobs up and down. She wonders what other words he is swallowing lest he say them aloud.

“Yes,” she says, slowly, dragging the word out longer than it deserves. “I am busy. There is a siege on. Where are my clothes?”

“I put them away,” he says quickly, and he points at the corner, where the neglected wardrobe stands. She hadn’t bothered unpacking her things properly in the months she’d had this room. At first it was because she hadn’t expected to stay long, then after the siege had started she hadn’t seen the point. 

Some part of her finds it frustrating, that he feels he can do what he wants so freely with her possessions, but an equal part of her understands. If their positions were reversed, she’d probably resort to womanly pursuits too. And at this point they are as much his things as hers. He has certainly worn her dress more than she was ever likely to.

So she doesn’t chastise him for it. She turns instead to the wardrobe, opening the drawers looking for what she came here for. She finds it not with her smallclothes, which she resolutely pretends must have placed themselves in the top drawer with magic, not by his hands, but in the bottom drawer, where he has packed away a clean set of linens for the bed along with her bathrobe. 

While she searches, she senses him hovering close behind her, can practically hear him wringing his hands. When she stands with the bag of cloths in her hands, she feels he is even closer still, and when she turns he steps back, his eyes widen. With fear, with shock. Yet standing this close, she can see how exhausted he is. How anxious. Something deep in her belly tightens, though it is not quite the same as her monthly cramps.

“Will you go again?” he asks, then seems to find some hardness from within, brittle and frail such as it is. 

Brienne doesn’t answer him, because she cannot think of how to respond. Which concern to address first. Instead she surveys the room, trying to figure out where she can go to attend to the bloody matter at hand. That is easier than trying to figure out how to attend to him. She had always been used to loneliness, so a week alone would likely not have affected her much. But though she does not know her husband well, she suspects he is a more social animal than her. By abandoning him for the week she had wounded him rather more than she’d anticipated, that much is clear. Her belly cramps tightly.

She retreats behind the privacy screen once more, and though he doesn’t follow her, she can hear how he lingers just on the other side. When she is sure he’ll stay where he is, respecting her space, she quickly undoes her trousers to inspect the mess.

“I’m sorry,” he says through the partition. It gives her pause as she wipes a wet cloth between her thighs.

It’s the last thing she expects. The cloth in her hand is red with her moonsblood, her thighs are still sticky and damp, but the smell of blood in the air does not feel like her own.

“I should not have read your letters,” he continues when she stays silent. “It was wrong. They were private. And I should not have used what I found in there against you. You have… you have been good to me. Better than I deserve. You’ve every right to throw me back in that dungeon and leave me there to rot, and you haven’t. I don’t know why you haven’t.”

He sounds so utterly defeated, she cannot help the prickle of guilt that tugs her throat tight. But she cannot do anything to correct the situation such as she is right now. “Just… give me a moment?” she asks him softly, catching his gaze through one of the holes decoratively whittled into the top of the partition. She sees his nod, and she quickly returns to the task at hand.

Brienne works as quickly as she can, soaking her soiled smallclothes before she tosses them in the hamper in the corner, so that the maid will have an easier time getting the blood out later. After that she changes into her clean cloths; really she is dirty enough she could have a proper bath, but it is too early to bother the maids to fill the tub, and she has more pressing concerns.

Once dressed again, she takes a steadying breath before she rounds the partition to face him. He has retreated to perch once again on the edge of her bed. He is truly exhausted. She’d certainly slept poorly this last week, but there is something to the pallor of his skin that says he’d fared worse. It is just another thing to add to her guilt.

So she takes three steps and sits beside him on the bed. Not so that they are touching, but near enough that she can feel the way the mattress dips slightly to her left, and she leans a little towards him, drawn close by some invisible force.

“I’m sorry too,” she says. “I should not have left you alone so long. I was… I was angry.”

“I know.” He looks at his hands, not at her. “It’s what I wanted. At the time.”

“Because you want to know about your brother.”

He nods. It is just a little nod of his head, but it is all she can see. If Galladon were out there, somewhere, alive, or her father, would she not have done anything, everything she possibly could on the hope it might save them? Jaime had done nothing more than what she would have done too, had their positions been reversed.

She looks at the roof and silently curses Renly. For letting Tyrion slip through his fingers, for thinking that this marriage between her and Jaime would solve his problems. For leaving her to clean up his messes. She is as much Renly’s wife as she is Jaime’s, the way she follows him around the country to keep his house and manage his affairs. For a terrible, shameful moment she is glad that her father is dead and cannot see the mess she has made.

But regret and frustration will not help here. Only the truth. Or as much of the truth as she can share safely.

“I can’t tell you about him,” she says, hoping he hears the honesty in her tone. “I wish I could, but…”

“--But Renly has forbid it?”

Brienne shrugs. It is near enough the truth. Perhaps that will be enough. It probably won’t, but her silence had done more damage.

She chances a look to the side, careful not to lift her head too much, in case he can read more on her face than she wants to share. But his eyes are downcast. This close she can see the depth of the circles beneath his eyes, the little lines around his lips as they tremble with unspoken words, or unspoken feelings, whatever it is he is struggling to contain within himself. 

She cannot stop it now, imagining the situation, reversed: if she were his prisoner, trapped in some tower room, married against her will for the sake of a political alliance, how would she like it? How would she feel?

The answer comes just as easily as the imagining. She would hate it, and she would hate him. She would fight with any weapon she might find, fight until her body broke, or her mind, and then she’d likely keep on fighting until she died. 

Brienne lets out a breath, slowly, through her teeth. Looks at the ceiling, as if she might spy the gods sitting there, laughing at how wonderfully their cruel jape had worked.

“Is he safe, at least?” Jaime asks quietly. If she hadn’t been sitting beside him she might not have heard him speak at all.

“He was when I last saw him,” she says, honestly. She does him the courtesy of looking at him as she says it. The shine of tears in his green eyes is the punishment she deserves for her mistreatment of him.

He is the one to look away. He swipes a finger beneath his eye. “Could you ask Renly if he will tell me more? After what happened to my sister… Tyrion is all I have left.”

She frowns. “Your father is still alive. We received another proposal of terms from him and the Tyrells a few days past.” They were ridiculous terms, which Renly would never accept. Renly wouldn’t accept anything less than complete surrender, though each day that outcome seemed more and more impossible. A stubborn Baratheon lord until the end.

“In body, perhaps. This war killed my father long ago,” he says, and sighs. Closes his eyes, and she has to resist the urge to gentle away the lines on his face. Softly rub at the little hairs near his temple. It’s an absurd impulse, and she keeps herself in check. Physically, at least.

But perhaps there is something else she could do to ease his burden some. To make him more comfortable, even if he must still stay her prisoner. 

“I will ask the maids to bring you needles and thread,” she says, remembering his request before he had turned the conversation on its heel so abruptly. “And if there is anything else you would like, I can try to arrange it for you.”

The moment the words leave her mouth, she regrets them. They feel awkward and inadequate; what could she possibly bring him, here in her tiny battle-axe room, that could ease his situation? A needle and thread? A condescending peace offering, that would surely only act as salt in his wounds.

But the explosive rage she expects does not eventuate. Instead there is an eerie silence that blankets the room in such a way that it sounds almost as though the crackling of the fire quiets in anticipation.

So when he shifts slightly on the bed next to her, the rustling of the fabric sounds like a crack of thunder in a summer storm. Brienne starts.

“Something to read would be nice,” he says. “I read your letters out of desperation. If I had known what they contained… I should not have read them.”

Brienne thinks of the abandoned library, shelves stocked to the rafters by the late Lady Baratheon, Renly’s mother, with books and tomes from all around the continent, and Essos too. “I can arrange that,” she agrees with a nod. Then sensing a hesitation in him, a hint that he is not quite finished, she prompts, “Anything else?”

He lets out a sudden bark of laughter, though there is nothing joyous in it. He speaks quickly, “A change of scenery would be nice,” and she can tell he thinks it is a futile request. Her room might not have chains, but it is his cell nonetheless. Even if she could figure out a way to let him out, if Renly were to find out he’d probably have him returned to the cell in which he was almost gruesomely murdered.

“I don’t think--”

“I know you can’t. I know. It’s fine,” he says, and sighs again. Wipes his face with his hands as though he could rub away the world-weary weight on his shoulders. “I shouldn’t have asked,” he says through his hands.

The urge to reach out to him comes upon her once again. He is surely in need of comfort and a better person--a better wife--would offer it to him. But she doesn’t. Her hands stay firmly clasped in her lap.

“I will bring you something tonight when I return,” she says, instead, and begins to stand. But before she can, he grabs for her hand, pulls her closer so that she cannot move away.

She tries to tug it free, but he is surprisingly strong. It sends a thrill up her spine, deep into her belly. He looks up at her. His eyes are still a little red, which makes the green seem all the brighter. The green of grass after rain, sodden, but sparkling and rich in the sunlight.

“Don’t go,” he says. “Stay. Please.”

“But I must--”

“Just for a little while.” If she didn’t know any better, she would think he was pleading with her. Begging. He tugs on her hand a little, squeezes her fingers where he holds them.

“You should rest,” she insists.

“So should you,” he counters, quickly. “You look as tired as I feel.”

She watches as his eyes dart about her face and she barely resists the urge to use her free hand to gently prod at the tender skin beneath her eyes. It has been months, years, probably, since she has had any restful sleep. It is nothing she is not used to, but yes, she is tired. She can admit that to herself, if no one else.

And perhaps it would not hurt to rest for an hour or so.

“All right,” she concedes, and turns towards the cot. But he doesn’t relinquish her hand, and keeps her in place.

“No,” he says. Panicked. Imploring. His face is an open book she still has no idea how to read. But something in his expression turns steely. “The cot is too small for you. For me, too. And this bed. It’s. There is room enough…”

“You mean you wish to share?”

“I will not touch you, I swear it.”

The thought of him taking advantage had not occurred to her until the moment he assured her otherwise. She remembers well the look on his face when she had dragged the would-be rapist to the dungeons, months ago. No, it is not that that worries her.

“We will just sleep,” he promises, then hesitates. Says, “And it is not like we have not shared this bed before.”

She frowns. It is not the same, surely. She had only slept beside him because he had been unconscious, and it had been so mortifying when he had properly woken to find her, there, beside him, vulnerable and sleepy.

“Imagine falling asleep beside your husband in your own bed,” he says, shyly, averting his gaze.

“What an impossibility,” she replies. Her heart pounds in her chest. He could so easily hurt her. Physically, or worse.

But she is tired. And truly, she doesn’t think he means to do anything. Not the way he’d done before. In truth, neither does she. Which is why, perhaps, she agrees. She can lie down in the bed until he falls asleep--the lying down would be restful in and of itself--and then she could slip from the covers and the room to attend to her duties. Renly would not likely miss her for an hour or two.

“All right,” she says. “Just for a short rest.” 

He nods his agreement eagerly, and shifts to pull the covers back for her. She slides in on one side of the bed, and he slips beneath the sheets opposite her. He is right. The bed is large enough for the two of them to lie there comfortably, and laying as they are there is every chance she could sleep the entire time without so much as touching a hair on his head, nor would he be likely to do the same. It will be a better bedding than she could have ever hoped for. 

But it is harder to worry about that when her head hits the pillow and when her body sinks into the plush featherbed. Together they gently hold her body in such a way she almost instantly relaxes, and even the sounds of her husband settling in beside her do not worry her as much as they had when she lay in the cot on the opposite side of the room. Her pounding heart eases.

“Thank you,” he says softly, for here, as they are, there is no need for him to project his voice. Already his eyes have begun to droop.

She doesn’t reply, but watches as he relaxes further into slumber. Watches as his face goes slack as he is claimed by sleep. She wonders how long it will take for the bags beneath his eyes to recede and restore him to his glorious beauty. He looks so peaceful as he sleeps; she wonders if she looks the same. Not as beautiful, surely, but peaceful.

How long she lies there, she cannot say. She means to get up once he is asleep; it is the least she can do. But she is tired. It is hard to keep her eyes open. And she can see little harm in resting here, for a moment or two, while he is also asleep. There is little danger when she can hear him breathing softly, steadily, beside her. Safe, just for a moment. Safe and carefree and calm.

* * *

Brienne wakes a little while later. She is warm and comfortable, and beside her Jaime sleeps on. The light that trickles through the window is still the dull softness of early morning, so she has either been asleep a full day, or more likely just a few hours. Even still she feels more rested than she has in weeks, and she doesn’t know what to make of it.

She wants nothing more than to lean into the urge to close her eyes and sleep on, as he still does. But she has responsibilities, and they will not wait if she rests.

Carefully she pushes back the covers, not wanting to disturb him while he is resting. As quietly as she can she redresses. Her fresh gambeson feels like a luxury after wearing her other one for a week, and with new stockings encasing her feet, her boots feel brand new. It is only when she reaches for her swordbelt, still slung over the back of the only chair in the room, that she realises she’d forgotten to hang the sword on its hook safely outside the room. He’d seen it there, he’d been watching when she stripped it off, but she had been too tired and distracted to clock her mistake as she made it.

He had convinced her to sleep beside him, vulnerable and weaponless, and at any moment he could have padded across the room, retrieved her sword, and run her through with it. The guard, too, would not likely survive a bout against the notorious Lion of Lannister. It is why she’d been so careful to keep away anything that he might possibly use as a weapon.

And yet he had done nothing but sleep.

Still, he sleeps, looking much younger and more innocent than he ever has while awake.

It is something she ponders as she goes about her usual daily duties. And if, throughout the day, it seems that her sword hangs a little heavier about her waist, then it is surely just her imagination.

* * *

Renly insists that she dine with him that evening. It has been some time since she has received an invitation, and there is no easy way to decline it. 

She expects he will want a report from her, about how the siege progresses, what her scouts have seen of the Tyrell forces. And at first he pours her a generous glass of wine and lets her give her report. But by the time he has drunk his first cup it is clear that he is no longer paying as much attention to what she is saying, though she could not say for certain what it is that has him so distracted.

Her own cup is largely untouched, but perhaps it is a stronger vintage than he is used to? He is not usually so inattentive.

No. That’s not quite true. He never _used_ to be. 

Or perhaps she’d just never noticed.

She finds she notices more these days. Perhaps it is the effect of the siege. Her days vary little, and the people she speaks with regularly vary less--with one notable exception--so even a little change looms large in her mind.

“How do you find married life?” Renly asks once she is done detailing their dwindling grain stores. The question comes out of nowhere--an unexpected lightning strike from clouds hidden behind a steady mountain--and she does not have the first idea of how to respond to it.

Renly doesn’t seem to mind her silence. He takes a long gulp, no, two, from his cup, emptying it, and continues on. “The maids report that he has recovered well from his injuries.”

The little bite of the roast potatoes she had eaten moments before seem to have stuck somewhere in the back of her throat. She swallows around where it is stuck, but it just becomes more painful. “He is much better,” she agrees around the blockage. Reaches for the wine and takes a bracing sip to clear it.

Renly laughs. She is even more confused.

“I bet you never thought you would marry someone so pretty,” he says, leaning across the table towards her as though he is sharing some great confidence with her.

Brienne does not know what to say, and the potato still thickens in her throat, so she nods, and takes another sip. The wine burns, but it does the trick, though she feels a little lightheaded when she sets her goblet back down.

Renly’s laugh this time is a joyous bark, and he slaps the table violently, causing the crockery and cutlery strewn about it to rattle. Brienne’s hand still caresses the goblet and she grips it tighter, so that it will not be upset and spill precious wine. 

“Tywin must hate this, truly,” he says, through his chuckles. “I have sent word to him, through channels, of the marriage. Sent my felicitations. Jaime always said Tywin wanted him to marry a Tully, or maybe a Martell--good breeding lines, you know, and rich, too. He wanted the dowry and the heir more than anything. I only wish I could see his face when he receives word. It would be better than breaking this damned siege!”

Brienne flushes at what he _doesn’t_ say, more so than what he does. Because she hears those words clearly. She is an unsuitable wife for one such as Jaime Lannister. His house is rich, and hers is impoverished. He stands to inherit the throne, should his family win this stupid war, and her family line will die with her. He is beautiful, she is… She is a joke.

She takes the chance to change the subject where she can. “My lord, since you mention the siege, there are several things we should discuss--”

“Oh, must we talk of such things when we have such a nice dinner before us?” Renly cries, waving at her as though he could dispel her words like smoke or fog.

“We should, yes,” she insists. “Our food stores are dwindling, as is the stock of firewood. And then there is morale. I worry--”

“You worry too much.”

“Renly--”

He slams his fist down on the table again. “Enough,” he shouts. The goblet topples, spilling red wine across the table. She had been too slow, this time, but she dare not mop up the bloody liquid. Not even when it trickles past her plate and drizzles onto the leg of her breeches.

“We will win this war,” Renly says firmly. “We will win it because I am Robert’s true heir, and the gods are on my side. _You_ must win this war for me.”

It is only through years of practice that she is able to keep her face neutral, without visible reaction. Her insides are a roiling, dangerous summer storm. They ride in unexpectedly from the west, deadly and destructive, with dark clouds swiftly appearing in the sky to wreak havoc upon the world. They are the kind that crackle with thunder and lightning and pelt icy rocks from the sky which destroy crops, kill livestock, even kill people, if they are so unfortunate as to be struck on the head in the wrong place. She feels struck by Renly’s words, stunned dumb and numb that to call it ‘surprise’ feels too mild.

“Of course,” she says, voice impossibly even and calm. “I will. Of course I will.”

He sends her away not long after that. She doesn’t protest, eager to escape his gaze. The moment she steps into the hallway she feels it: bile rising in her throat. It is all she can do to round the corner, get out of the sight of his guards, and through the closest door--she doesn’t not bother to think what room it is--when the wine and the potatoes and the rest of Renly’s lurid, decadent meal come pouring out of her. She managed to make it to one of the room’s windows, where thankfully the servants have kept the shutters open, and she can hear how the vomit splatters against the stone walls, and then, faintly, where it hits rocky ground below. If only she had managed to keep her composure until she’d rounded the next corner. She might have been able to soil one of the Tyrells’ siege weapons on that side of the castle. This side looks out across Shipbreaker Bay. 

She lets her head rest, for a moment, against the cool stone of the window sill. It is rough against the skin of her forehead, and beneath her hands where they grip at the walls to stay steady, but it is grounding, and it gives her space to think. She cannot be here long. Anyone might walk in and see her. It is then that she glances up to look at where she is.

It is the library.

She feels a mad bubble of her own laughter building as she looks up and down the stacks of stuffed shelves that line each side of the room. It is either laughter or tears, neither of which she can allow, here, where she is so exposed. Where anyone might follow her in and see her. But that she should find herself here, of all places, after everything that has happened.

Gods. After everything.

What a joke.

There is little time to peruse the shelves to find something he might like. Not that she truly knows him well enough to make an appropriate selection. If he was willing to read her father’s letters to pass the time, then he will have to make do with what she snatches until she can find time to come back again to choose something better.

Brienne slips the books under her arm and leaves through the door she’d entered, quickly, making sure to stand as tall as she can while she does. The hallways are empty, for the most part, but for the guard that stands, ever present outside her own bedroom door, there at her request. She sets the books down carefully on the floor so she can unbuckle her sword belt, remembering all the while her lapse of memory that morning.

When she finally enters the room, and the lock clicks shut behind her, she is struck by a strong cramp, though whether it is still a holdover from her conversation with Renly or her moonsblood, it is hard to tell. She feels terrible, like her body is trying its very best to fall apart while she absolutely cannot afford to let it do so. There is not the time, nor is there anything to do for it. What tincture is there to cure Renly’s madness? What salve will cure her dread?

But the room is lit brightly, and it is pleasantly warm. Jaime has moved her chair so that it is by the fire, though he does not sit in it. He hovers by the fire, and at first she is confused until she sees what he is tending to: the maid has suspended a kettle to boil.

“You’re back,” he says, standing up suddenly. He has a metal hook in his hand. The kind one uses to remove the kettle from the fire, though she is sure he could do her some damage with it, if he were so inclined. She can’t bring herself to care.

He frowns. “Are you all right?” He sounds concerned, eyes catching on her stomach, where her hand has unconsciously drifted to hold her abdomen. She drops it away.

 _No_ , she thinks, but cannot say it aloud. Instead she holds out the books to him. “If. If these aren’t to your liking I can get you something else,” she says, and swallows, aware of the foul taste of bile in her mouth. 

“I’m sure they’ll be fine,” he says, and hangs the hook beside the fire so he can take the books from her. 

As he does their fingers brush a little, and before she can snatch her hand back, he somehow grabs her wrist in a firm grip. Not painful, but insistent, and he tugs her gently forward to where the chair is. “Sit,” he commands, and despite good sense, despite everything, she lets him. She could blame her exhaustion, or her disillusion, her terror, her fear, but ultimately none of it matters. What does she care? What does it matter now?

She sinks into the chair, which he has made a little more comfortable with the addition of a cushion and a blanket. He sets the books down on the table, but returns to her quickly, crouching down before her. “You’re exhausted. Let me help you,” he says, and she feels a light touch on the side of her ankle.

Before she can say anything, he begins to work at her laces. He has one boot off quickly, then the next, and he sets them beside the fireplace. 

“Why did you agree to it?” she asks, before she truly knows why she’s asking.

“Agree to what?” He turns back to the fire, collecting the hook to safely remove the kettle. Then she hears the hollow echo of liquid being poured into a cup. She can smell, now, light, familiar herbs, though what they remind her of eludes her now, as exhausted as she is.

“Why did you agree to marry me.” She asks the question to his back, the space between his shoulder blades. They cannot see how she blushes. When he turns, she looks at her feet instead. “Why did you agree to be my husband,” she clarifies, unnecessarily. That is what it means to be married, after all. He is her husband. She is his wife. In the eyes of the law, at least, if not yet the gods.

He doesn’t answer straight away.

“I never wanted to marry,” he says, so quietly she barely hears him, facing away from her, as he is. “I wanted to be a knight, to serve the realm. Protect the weak and innocent.”

“So why did you—?” she asks, unable to ask the whole question again. It is too much. _Why did you agree to marry me?_ He turns, and presses the warm cup into her hands. The aromatics of the tea are stronger now, and she recognises the brew. A common tincture women drink, a mixture of ginger and motherwart that will hopefully ease her cramps. 

That she did not speak her thought aloud does not seem to matter. He knows, and answers her question anyway. “Because I thought it would work,” he says. “I thought it would help end the war. I thought it would help me find my brother, and end this siege, and the battles that rage outside these walls.”

“But you did not know me.”

He shrugs. 

“What is an unhappy marriage compared to the peace of the realm?”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The truce holds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tyvm as always to Luthien and nire and others who have helped and supported me as this progresses. Please note the final chapter count!

Their truce holds.

Brienne distrusts it at first, still wary of the power he could wield over her, when she is at her softest and most vulnerable. It’s a habit born of years of being alone. Travelling in army camps, yes. Sleeping in her armour so that no one might be able to slip a hand under her clothes while she slept. 

But if she is honest with herself, the habit started earlier than that. Even when she was a child, safe in her father’s castle, she’d never wanted anyone to share her room. Not her nurses when she was a babe, nor her septa when she was older. She’d liked her space, liked the peace of being alone with her thoughts, without any eyes to watch, or mouths to question.

Still, she finds that it is not as bad as she’d imagined. Jaime proves to be more considerate than she’d expected, especially considering his lack of resources. But he seems to have befriended the maids who attend her room, and in return—after checking with her, first, that it is all right—they have acquiesed to some of his requests. There is always a little food in the room, nothing special or decadent, just a little bread and hard cheese. Occasionally a little dried meat. Often she forgets to eat while she mans the walls, or hasn’t the appetite to when she climbs down, but she finds that she will graze, some, after she has tidied up before bed. It is nice to have the food there.

It is not the only way he thinks of her. 

He has her clothes cleaned regularly, and each night, after she strips off her amour, he tends to it like some kind of eager green squire, checking the straps and buckles, dusting off the dirt and sometimes the dried blood, then oiling the joints, so that to wear it feels almost lighter than it ever has, even when it was freshly forged.

But the most thoughtful thing he does for her is to organise a bath. The tub, that long ago some lord took great pains to have installed in this very room, she has only very rarely asked the maids to fill. It is large, and deep, and too decadent by halves; the maids have to make many, _many_ trips to fill it with hot water, and there are more important things to attend to than that. Brienne has made do with her little basin of water and a kettle over the fire, for when the nights have been too cold for her to bear washing herself with an icy cloth.

She smells it when she arrives back from another long night atop the walls, fighting Renly’s pointless, fruitless war. The air of the room hits her as she walks in, thicker with steam and some pretty floral smell. 

“What is this?” she asks, slowly, while hanging her sword on the back of the door.

“A bath,” he says, just as slowly, though there is a little light in his eye that tells her he is japing. He has moved the chair beside the tub, and is sitting in it, dragging his arm languorously through the steamy water. He has rolled up the sleeves of the shirt he wears—one of hers, loose and ill-fitting as it is—so that it doesn’t get wet.

“You don’t need a bath,” she says.

He smiles at that, and stands, flicking his arm downward to wick the excess water from his arm back into the tub. Then he flourishes that very same arm above the water, like the players in the travelling troupes that move between towns, telling tall tales. “It’s for you,” he says. “It seems a waste to have such a nice tub here just and not use it.”

“How did you—”

“I have my ways,” he soothes, and steps forward to tug gently at the buckles of her armour.

She grabs his hand with her own, stilling it in its task. “I can’t,” she says, and swallows. Her stomach clenches, though at what, she can’t say. It could be the guilt that those poor maids were made to do this. But it could also be the way his hands grip her own, squeezing gently in just the way her father used to.

It could be that.

“Why not?” he asks gently, fingers tightening around her own ever so slightly, though it is not at all painful. “The water is already here. It will cool whether you take a soak or not. Might as well hop in and get clean.” He gently moves her hand to the side and continues his work, tugging and pulling until he has removed the vambraces from each arm. Then he lifts her chest plate over her head and hangs it all on the special armour stand in the corner. 

“It’s—” her voice fails in her struggle to explain. It is because he ambushed her; she has had no chance to prepare for such an onslaught.

“It’s what?” he prompts, returning and kneeling before her so that he can work at the ties that fix her greaves in place. 

Brienne looks to the vaulted ceiling for her answer. It is not there either, but she finds it a little easier to speak when she isn’t looking directly at him. “It’s too much,” she says, eventually. By then he has loosened the laces on her boots as well.

“It’s not too much,” he says, and it takes her some time to discern the tone she hears in his own words—the tone of firm kindness. She hardly recognised it.

He stands slowly then, almost crawling up the length of her own body, standing much closer than he ever has—she can smell the air he breathes out when he is as close as this. It sets her heart racing. “It’s not too much,” he says again, and then he brushes her too-long hair behind her ear.

“It is an indulgence. It is not right,” she whispers.

“Then we will share it,” he whispers back.

Brienne’s heart beats quicker still at that. What she had thought had been her heart at a gallop had been but a leisurely trot. Surely he could hear it. She could.

“You first.”

“No,” he grabs her hand above the wrist and tugs her in the direction of the tub. “We’ll share.”

The steam of the bath feels impossibly hot, this close—surely it will blanch the skin from her muscles if she were to step foot in there. 

“We can wear our small clothes. I will close my eyes, or you could wrap a cloth about my face if you do not trust me to look. I know it makes you uncomfortable to be seen that way by me.”

“That’s not—” she says in protest, but the look he gives her is so compassionate and open. There is no judgement there on his features, though he, of all people, perhaps has the most right of anyone to judge her. She has kept him imprisoned here for months. She has waged war against his family, she has ruined his chance of marrying for love. And yet, despite it all, he has become the person who sees her best.

Perhaps better than anyone ever has.

“All right,” Brienne agrees, and before she can second guess herself any further, clinging to whatever courage she still has left, she tugs at the laces of her tunic, exposing first her collar bones, and then her sternum. She looks at her fingers as she works, so as not to look at him and see some expression of disgust. It’s not that she thinks he will, not truly, but it would break her heart all the same and better to avoid the chance by keeping her eyes on her task.

When she is done with the laces she rolls her shoulders a little and lets the fabric fall to the floor. Only then does she look up; he is there, standing on the other side of the bathtub watching her, his pale skin glowing in the dim light of the fire and the meagre candles he has lit. His eyes, though, are on hers, not on the expanse of skin she has just exposed. 

She watches as, with equally slow movements, he removes his own shirt, tugging with both hands up over his head. But she cannot control her impulse as he does, and she looks down from his face, not to his chest, but to the red scar on his neck. It still looks red and angry, but it has healed better than she could have hoped. It is the only imperfect thing about him.

He looks down, then, to the tub between them. “You know, I’ve never seen such a big tub,” he says, tracing his hands along the metal edge. She can hear the way it sings beneath his fingers, the sound like ice, pricking gooseflesh across her belly. “I wonder how they got it in the room.”

She barks a laugh, then shoots her hand up to cover her mouth, as though she could somehow pull the sound back inside her.

Jaime doesn’t seem to mind. His eyes twinkle. “What?” he asks, chuckling too. 

“I’ve.. I’ve been wondering the same thing for months,” she says. It feels like a weight lifted off her chest. A confession, or near enough.

He leans his head to the side, considering the tub from another angle. “Did they tip it on its side? On it’s end?” 

She laughs again, but he doesn’t stop his rolling speculation. “You know, I think they must have somehow lifted it through the window… All that effort for some fat Baratheon lordling who probably died climbing into the damn thing. It is almost as deep as it is long!”

As he speaks his hands move to his belt, which he unbuckles with efficient movements. He doesn’t hesitate, and removes both his trousers and his smallclothes in one quick movement, then climbs into the tub. The moment he is submerged in the steamy water he lets out an ungodly noise of satisfaction and closes his eyes. She takes her chance and quickly removes her own trousers and smallclothes, too. 

“You know, it doesn’t matter how they got the thing in here, what matters is that you have had this in your room this entire time and you haven’t used it.”

Brienne doesn’t respond. Instead she sinks into the tub, sliding her backside down the metal edge opposite him until she is seated. He has curled his legs close to his chest so that she doesn’t squash on his feet, but once she is settled he stretches them out carefully again, and she does the same, her legs tangling with his. But she finds she doesn’t mind. Already she can feel the good the hot water is doing for her muscles; she feels looser, more relaxed. The maids have tipped some fragrant tonic into the water which the steam diffuses into the air and it is beyond calming. When she takes a deep breath, and smells the mild lavender and valerian, it’s hard to remember why she had resisted this luxury for so long.

“It’s nice, isn’t it,” he prompts again, settling his arms along the sides of the tub.

She reaches to the side, where there is a table with some clean cloths and a bar of soap. “Don’t get it into your head that this will be a regular thing,” Brienne says, throwing one of the cloths at his face. It hits him lightly on the nose, then drops into the water with a plop. 

It doesn’t wipe away his smile.

* * *

It is some days later that Brienne finds a way to repay his gesture.

It’s not that she needed to, or that he had ever implied that he had organised the bath for her with the hope that she would return the favour. No, she is sure it had been entirely selfless on his part. But she still feels she owes him a debt, of a sort. His thoughtfulness and kindness have taken her by surprise, and she has found herself thinking of it more and more. To think that this man she married while he was bound and gagged could be more considerate of her needs and feelings than her own family had ever been…

It is…

It means something.

What, she isn’t sure, but it has kindled some feeling that sits warmly behind her belly button, and in her throat. It is a tender something. Something that she wants to protect and hide from anyone outside their room, because they would not understand it. _She_ barely understands it, but she doesn’t feel the need to question it. At the moment, when every other part of her day is one horror after another, the little moments of tranquility he has been able to help her find are enough.

Her moment of inspiration comes as she returns from her shift atop the walls a different way than she normally does. Usually, she detours via the barracks, so that she can debrief informally with the other commanders, but the atmosphere there lately has left her feeling decidedly unwanted. The troops know she is close with Renly, and she knows their resentment at the continuing siege has grown much, this last month. And she has done what she can to give them relief: increased their rations, had more barrels of ale brought up from the stores, and she has done so without informing Renly, knowing that he would not see the logic in it. She thinks it has helped, but she knows that what the troops want most, more than fuller bellies and a drink in their hands, is freedom to gripe and moan without having to watch their tongues around her. 

So she takes the shorter route through the training yards to give them their freedom. At this time of night they are empty and abandoned; for anybody else it might have seemed a haunted place, to see it so quiet when it is usually bustling with activity. But she doesn’t mind it. The training yards at Evenfall had always been a refuge for her, far more than any sept, and though this one is bigger, and better equipped, it has the same smell: of mud and straw and stale sweat. 

The idea comes to her when she lingers there, relishing the calm quietude of the place when everyone else is asleep. She is quite distracted by a memory, perhaps sparked by the familiar smell, of the very first time her father had brought her to the yards at Evenfall to train. It was hardly the first time she’d visited, having spent months prior annoying all the men there, and Goodwin, the master-at-arms, had resisted her begging to try her hand at it, telling her that he would happily train her the day her father brought her down and put a sword in her hand. 

That had given her a target, and she had relentlessly worked at her goal until finally, _finally_ , her lord father had acquiesced. The wooden practice sword had been heavier than she’d expected, but she wouldn’t forget soon the grooves in the grain beneath her palm. That memory was only eclipsed by the day Goodwin had decided she was good enough to try her hand at a blunted metal blade.

For weeks she has been thinking of something to bring to Jaime that would take him by surprise. He has been satisfied with the books she has collected for him from the library, mostly novels and stories of old Andal myths and legends, but a true sword would be too much—if Renly ever got word that she’d given him a weapon he’d likely toss Jaime back down into the dungeons, and she couldn’t stand the thought. It is risky enough that she brings her own sword inside each night, though Jaime still has shown no interest in it.

But a wooden sword… A child’s plaything.

Idly, she wanders into the armoury, noting the empty sword racks along the side walls. But she quickly finds what she is looking for: a barrel filled with bundles of training swords. They are dusty, plainly haven’t been touched in months, which makrs sense as anyone who is strong enough to hold a sword has been given a true one to wield, training be damned. The swords will hardly be missed by the Storm’s End’s master-at-arms. Before anyone should see, unlikely as it was, she collects two swords and tucks them under her arm. She returns to their rooms a little quicker, then, eager to deliver him his gift.

She finds him by the fire, tending the kettle as has become his habit. He calls out a greeting to her the moment she steps through the door. “Welcome back.”

“Leave the tea,” she says, because he is already fidgeting with the metal hook and a folded over cloth to remove the kettle from where it hangs above the fire. “I have something for you.”

Jaime straightens with a slightly puzzled look on his face for just a moment before his eyes land upon the wooden swords tucked under her armpit. When it clicks, when he recognises what it is she carries, his expression transforms and it almost takes her breath away. To her he has always been impossibly beautiful, even when she had carried from his dungeon, the both of them drenched in his blood. But now, he is positively ethereal in his awe and disbelief and delight. If only she had been more dedicated when her septa had tried to teach her to draw, or to embroider—anything to capture that look as it is now. She never wants to forget it.

“Here,” she says, and thrusts one of the swords in his direction, hilt first. He hesitates but for a heartbeat before he takes it from her, looking at it with such wonder and reverence that it could have been a Valyrian steel blade rather than an old, battered training tool.

“Really?” he breathes, turning it over in his hand, his wrist moving this way and that.

She nods, and raises the other in his direction, a common, friendly gesture often seen between knights sharing a training yard. “I thought you might want to practise.”

His eyes widen at that, then his grin quickly follows suit. Like a sunflower blooming impossibly in the firelight. “Now? You’re not too tired?”

“I have energy enough for this,” she says with a laugh.

He assumes the position across from her and holds out the blade. She mirrors him. And at once they both realise the problem: too much furniture in the way. They catch each other’s eye and a volley of laughter bubbles up between them.

Together they set their swords aside and make quick work of the furniture, shoving the chairs into the gap between the large bed and the wall. Jaime rolls up the rug at the foot of the fireplace and tucks the roll into the (thankfully empty) bathtub. As he does that, Brienne lifts her heavy trunk and sets it down across the narrow little entrance way, and then sets her armour stand atop it, where it will be out of her way. 

It is then she realises she should probably remove her armour too, if it is to be a fair fight. The worst he could do with a training sword is give her a walloping bruise, but she’s confident enough in her own skills and over the years she has heard enough praise of his that she is sure it cannot all be without merit.

Brienne starts working at the buckles on her vambraces, and once Jaime is finished clearing the room of all the biggest obstacles and sees what she is doing he comes over to help. She is almost used to it now, how close he stands to her as he does this, the way that she can sometimes smell his breath when he undoes the buckles at her shoulders. But there is a palpable energy about him now that sends a shiver up her spine and a tingle across her skin. She isn’t sure she’s ever looked forward to a fight as much as this one.

Soon enough the armour is off, her true sword and belt hung carefully on the armour stand and the wooden one is back in her hand. 

He stands across from her, and she from him. 

It is the first time she thinks they have stood so, as equals. They are almost of a height, she realises, though she is a fraction taller. However she knows better than to underestimate him on such grounds; she has beaten many men over the years because they thought the battle already won against her, purely on the grounds of her sex or her face. He is one of the few _living_ swordsmen she’d heard stories of when she was just a girl, honing her skills on Tarth. 

“Might I have this dance, my lady?” he asks, with a little bow of his head.

She returns the bow neatly, then steps forward, and without warning swings the wooden blade high above her head to bring it down on his—an unsubtle first strike, but it is just the kind of strike that a green squire would try, thinking to overpower his opponent. But to her it is a fitting choice. A juvenile strike for a juvenile weapon.

Jaime meets her blade with a smile and his own, and they knock apart with a loud, hollow thunk. It is not the clean zing of metal on metal, but the sound is pleasant for her to hear. It reminds her of those first bouts with Goodwin—perhaps some of the happiest moments of her life.

Her opponent doesn’t hesitate, and attacks her back with an equally risky, childish move: a lunge. It over-extends his arm, and is downright comical to attempt in such close quarters, but the smile on his face matches hers. He knows what she is doing. She deflects it and laughs.

It is an easy bout. More feeling each other out than any true competition, and it is just what Brienne needs. She thinks it is just what he needs too, if the expression on his face is any indication. He looks a little younger, like this. More free. And his energy gives her energy too, so even though she has had a long day, and should be exhausted, they fight long into the night. 

When they stop it because he forces it, stepping back and bowing deeply—an old-fashioned sign of respect, but she returns it nonetheless. He straightens and wipes a line of sweat from his face; she does the same, feeling it trickle down her hairline. 

“You are stronger than me,” he says, sounding impressed.

She sets her sword aside, resting it against the wall, so that she can pour them both some water. “You are just out of practice,” she says. “I would not be so strong if I was locked up for months in a tower.”

He barks a laugh at that. “You make me sound like a princess,” he says, and takes the cup she offers. “Like we are in some sort of tale. You the brave knight, and me, your lady in need of protection.”

Heat blooms in her cheeks, and she cannot entirely blame the exercise. She stammers an apology, or the beginnings of one, but he cuts her off before she can finish, grasping her by the shoulder so that she must look at him.

“Don’t,” he says. “There is no need. It was a jape, nothing more. Besides, there is some truth to it, is there not?” He nods in the direction of her armour where it sits on its stand. Out of the corner of her eye it almost looks like a third person in the room, ominous and formidable and foreboding.

“Am I to rescue you, then?” She asks it tentatively, still a little afraid of his reaction, despite the look of reassurance on his face, in his green eyes.

He shrugs and releases her shoulder. “I think we both may have to rescue each other.”

With that, he turns back to the fire and sets about preparing her supper. For the rest of the evening, things proceed as they usually do, though there is an ease between them now she has not noticed before. Together, without needing to discuss it, they return the furniture to its original configuration so they can get ready for bed as they have done, without incident, for weeks. It is not until later, when they are beneath the covers, and she can hear the soft way he breathes when he is asleep, that she truly has time to realise the truth of his words. And they cut her worse than any blade, practice or real.

She is just as trapped in this castle as he is.

* * *


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They are sleeping when it happens.

* * *

They are sleeping when it happens.

It has come easier to her, of late. Sleep. Ever since she brought the wooden practice swords back to the room, they have sparred late into the night, and as a result she has often fallen into bed exhausted and warm and exhilarated and relaxed in a way she had truly never felt before. And the sleep she has managed has been deep and dreamless. Restorative.

So she doesn’t hear when the door opens.

She doesn’t hear the man whispering as he enters her room, nor does she hear the soft zing as he draws his sword from his scabbard and approaches the bed.

But Jaime does.

He barely has time to shake her awake when the intruder is on them. A man with a sword, thrusting it recklessly into the mattress. It is only pure luck that neither of them are hurt, and when Brienne realises what is happening she kicks out as hard as she can—but the sheets have wrapped around her legs in her sleep and he is only knocked sideways a little. 

The attacker wrenches the sword back out from where it is lodged in the featherbed, sending feathers flying into the air. They catch the moonlight, but there are so many, everywhere, and she is still sleep drunk and cannot see. But the swordsman grunts before he swings, and that is warning enough. She rolls to the side, dragging the blankets with her as she does, falling heavily from the bed onto the stone floor, knocking her head hard against the stone floor. A starburst of moonlit feathers blooms behind her eyes, dazed and confused and she only barely hears someone calling her name, loudly, so loud, too loud. And a man is standing over her. She can see his silhouette. His sword is raised, ready to strike her where she lies and she can do nothing but pray...

He falls across her, a heavy burden that knocks the air from her lungs. In her panic she cannot budge him, cannot make him move. There is blood, she can feel its warmth drenching her through the tangle of sheets. Is this dying? This is not how she wished to die, soaked in bloody sheets. Her mother had died this way, and now it is her fate too. Now it is her death too… 

“Brienne!” Jaime calls again, and then the weight is gone, shifted aside and she can breathe, though still it feels harder than it should. There is a clanking of metal on stone. She turns to see her sword lying there, drenched in wine-dark blood. 

Jaime’s hands have found her. He is lifting her up, a careful hand around the back of her neck, supporting her head, the other behind her shoulder blades. The movement makes her dizzy and her vision goes white again, but his hands are a steadying presence and she focuses on them. On the feeling of the rough skin of his hands on her neck, on the way his fingertips curl into her shift. On the way she can feel soft, comforting vibrations where her forehead is resting against his shoulder…

He is talking. He is saying something. She forces herself to focus. “—you hurt?”

“My head… I…” She brings her hand up to hold her temple. It comes away slick with blood. She has no idea if it is hers or the man’s. It turns her stomach in any case. 

“You need to get up,” he says, tugging her by the arms. She tries to, tries to get her legs beneath her, but it is harder than it should be. But it doesn't matter. He lifts her easily, away from the body of the man, setting her back down on the end of the bed. He collects her bloody sword from the ground and presses it into her hands. 

“We need to go,” he says, then turns to find the clothes they’d discarded before they’d fallen into bed the night before. He tugs a pair of breeches up his legs, and hastily tugs a tunic over his head. But he is not done. He guides her head through the collar of a tunic of her own, and gently threads her arms into the sleeves. Getting her into her own pair of breeches is a little bit more trouble, but he somehow manages it. The boots he leaves till last, tugging them up her calves one at a time, then he is tugging _her_ back to her feet.

“What’s happening?” she asks, doing her best to follow behind him, but the dizziness makes it hard, and she has to steady herself against the wall with her free hand. Jaime holds her other hand, having taken the sword back from her when they stood. He leads the way down the corridor, sword held up high in a defensive guard, and guides her through the open door. 

“I think the siege has broken,” Jaime mutters, head turning this way and that as he looks down the hallway in each direction. “Which way do we go?”

The siege? She should be on the walls, fighting with her men to the last, not sleeping in her feather bed. And Renly, _gods_ , Renly. Does he know? Has someone told him? Or will someone attack _him_ in his bed as they have attacked her? She should go to him. He will need her by his side.

“ _Fuck_ Renly,” Jaime said, viciously, startling her. “We need to get out of here! How do we get out of here?”

“The Tyrells will kill him,” she says, almost pleading. The thought chills her to her very core. Renly has been all she’s had for years, and she cannot let him face this unprotected. He has never been very good in a fight; his skills lie in diplomacy, not in bloodshed, and it would be dishonourable if she were to abandon him now.

Jaime grabs her by the shoulder and forces her to turn, to look at him. “Did you not see what that man was wearing?” he hisses, jutting his chin in the direction of their room.

She blinks, and tries to think. But it is like making her thoughts wade through honey, and her head is truly pounding now. In the distance, she hears shouting. A lot of shouting.

“He was not in Tyrell colours, nor Lannister colours,” he says, and there is a desperation there. “The door was not broken down, Brienne. Where was the guard?”

Brienne looks along the hallway, but there is no guard here. Nor are there any signs of a struggle that she can see. No body, no blood. And Jaime is right, the lock isn’t broken. Whoever got into their room had a key.

“I don’t understand…” She feels like she could cry. Nothing is making any sense. If only her head would stop ringing, it would be enough and she could sort this mess out. She presses the heel of her hand against her temple, which gives her some relief. If she could just work through the pain...

But before she can get her thoughts in order, five men round the corner. They are armed, and there is rage in their eyes like she has never seen before. 

Worst of all, she recognises them. 

Jaime steps in front of her and raises her sword. 

It’s almost impossible odds. Five against one, fighting in a narrow corridor, dark but for the trickle of moonlight that comes through the high windows above. And she knows Jaime is still not at his best. She knows the strength of his arm, how quickly he tires. She knows he is weak when someone attacks on his off side, and that his fresh scar means he cannot turn his neck as far as he used to be able to.

And yet.

It’s beautiful to watch. He moves with a grace that is both familiar and unexpected. She has seen it, in their rooms, in their fights, the fluidity and the raw talent. The first two soldiers that charge forward and are dispensed with with ruthless efficiency. He levers the second off the end of his sword; the man falls solidly to the ground, a growing pool of putrid blood and excrement. She steps backwards, as if a step back would get her away from the smell and the instantaneous nausea that has swelled in her throat, but she hits the stone wall instead. She can see, here, in this light, the familiar Baratheon armour he wears.

The next three soldiers approach Jaime more cautiously. And they last a little longer against him—until they don’t. When he has done them in, with the same ruthless efficiency he dispatched the first two, he straightens, letting the tip of his sword dip a little lower, and he turns to her, turns and looks at her with such concern and compassion she doesn’t know what to say.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

“How did you do that?” she breathes. “Five men…”

“Because I had to,” he says simply, and he reaches out with his free hand to grab her own. “We have to go. More will come soon and we need to get you to safety.”

“Me?” She frowns. They are Baratheon men. _Her_ men. They are no danger to her. She has fought with these men for years, has kept them fed and clothed and as happy as she can through this months-long siege. They are loyal to Renly just as she is… And yet she recognises these dead men, just as she recognised the one who’d come into their room. The one who had needed no key. Her head pounds thicker than before. “No.”

With the hand he holds he tugs her closer. Her hip knocks against his pelvis. He is so close. So close and so warm. “There must be a way out of here. _Think_.”

She wants to cry. It is too much for her, too much at once, and she cannot comprehend it. It doesn’t make sense. “I have to go to Renly,” she says, because it is the only thing she _can_ say. It is the only thing she can do. There will be no escape for her. 

“ _No,_ ” Jaime hisses. “They will be after him the same as you, if he’s not dead already. We have a chance to escape. Together.”

Brienne shakes her head, though it hurts to do so.

“Renly—” 

He cuts her off. “Fuck Renly. Fuck your loyalty to him. He is _using_ you, Brienne. He is using you and you either don’t notice or don’t care, and you are better than him, than this. You are _good_ and you are gentle and he is ruining you. He already tried to with this marriage. He tried to ruin us both with it. He thought to break me with you, but you have made me stronger still, and I would not have you die for him. Not when you could live with me. I want you to _live_.”

Then he leans forward, pulls her waist closer with the hand that still holds the sword. Brienne can feel the flat of it along her backside, pressing her to him with unmistakable intent. And then he is kissing her. His lips on hers the final seal of their months-long wedding vows. She could push him away, if she wanted to; his grip on her is not so strong as that, not meant to trap her, but to hold her close, hold her tenderly. Hold her as a man holds his wife. With love.

She doesn’t push him away. 

Instead she breathes him in, relishes the moment. Because it can only be that. A moment. An instant. A shared breath or two. A heartbeat of happiness just for her, that no one can take from her, where she can feel what it is like to be loved. Feel what her mother must have felt when she was held by her father. Feel protected and safe and cherished. His hand, the one not holding her sword, drifts upwards from her hip, brushing her waist, the side of her breast, before resting lightly on the back of her neck, fingers buried in the curls of her hair. Then he tugs at the hair there, just a little, and not at all painfully, which sends a hot bolt of warmth through her core. 

She pulls away, panting a little. But his hand in her hair keeps her close, so that their foreheads are resting against each other.

“Please,” he begs, voice barely a whisper, barely a breath. “You can’t save him.”

“I have to try,” she says, voice cracking. He closes his eyes. She can feel his sigh on her lips. “But… there is a way… There is a way out. For you.”

He draws back, though his hand stays in her hair. She brings her own hand up to grasp his. “You can leave. It’s… it’s the way your brother escaped, months ago.”

“What?”

“We haven’t had him for months. He escaped well before you ever climbed over these walls to save him. There is a tunnel just ahead that leads to a smugglers cove beneath the castle. Your brother convinced a guard, a sellsword stuck in here when the siege began, to smuggle him out in a skiff. They were gone before they could be caught. You could escape the same way. No one will know, the way things are here. They will be too distracted…”

Her voice fails her then, but it doesn’t matter. There is nothing more to say. This is the end. She has known for months there was no way out for her, but she likes the thought that he will be free. He belongs in sunlight, her husband, not kept prisoner behind cold stone walls. And it is all but certain now he will be king, given time. She thinks he will make a good king. Much better than Renly. She can see that now, see Renly’s failings as a leader. Too late, it seems, but she sees it. 

But still she’ll go to him. One last time, she’ll go. Naive and stupid and loyal to the very end.

Without another word she takes Jaime by the hand and guides him quickly down the corridor. They keep as quiet as they can. He still holds her sword tightly, ready to fight should any more soldiers come, but for the first time all night the gods must be looking kindly down upon them. For though Brienne can hear, through the thick walls, the battle getting louder—dangerous rumblings and blood-curdling screams that strike terror into her very core—they encounter no one.

Finally they reach it. The entrance to the tunnel is behind a tapestry, half a corridor away from the Lord’s chambers. Brienne is heartened to find it is still empty; the rebelling soldiers have not reached him here, yet. It is only a matter of time.

She lifts the tapestry away from the wall. “It will be dark, but it is a direct path. You will not get lost,” she says. “There will be a small fishing boat there. Do not take it out into the bay, it will be too dangerous, but the current should drag you west to Griffin’s Roost and it is night so you should not be spotted by the army outside…”

He shakes his head and grips her hand tighter. “Come with me,” he pleads, one last time. “There is nothing left for you here.”

“This is _all_ I have left,” she replies, and because it is the last time she will see him, because there is nothing for them after this, she brings her free hand up to cup his cheek, brushes away an errant tear from where it wells at the edge of his shockingly vibrant eyes. She wants to remember this, remember the feel of his face in her palm. Remember him, even if it is not for much longer.

A sound startles her back to reality, a sound at the end of the hallway, muffled by a closed door, but the jeers and cries are unmistakable. They are coming.

She lets her hand drop away

“Farewell, wife,” he says, and leans in to kiss her again. Kiss her one last time.

She makes a noise against his lips. It is better that way. She would not have the words even if she had a voice to speak.

Jaime pulls away and she lifts the edge of the tapestry for him. He ducks beneath it and into the passageway beyond, and she lets the fabric fall. She gives herself a moment to grieve. Just a moment. A moment for the vicious weight to crush and press her chest so she cannot breathe, to grip her head so tightly she cannot think. A moment to think of all she might have had with him, if she had followed him down the hallway. The life she could have had, the life they could’ve had together.

He was more than she had ever dreamed of and better than she deserved. He would be a king, soon enough. If he cared for the country the way he had cared for her, there in their room, when there had been no one to know or mind how he treated her. When there was no reason for him to be gentle and kind and thoughtful. If he cared for Westeros as well as he had cared for her, well... He would be a better king than Renly could have ever hoped to be.

And a good king deserves a good queen.

Perhaps once this was all over he will find someone deserving.

She turns away from the tapestry and makes her way along the corridor, taking those last final steps to Renly’s rooms. For better or worse, this is where she ought to be. This is where she will face the end of her days. 

Here with Renly.

Here alone.

* * *

The door to Renly’s rooms is unlocked, and they are quiet when she enters. There are no candles lit here, and she hopes that means he is blessedly ignorant of the riot that has broken out within his walls. At that thought, her heart leaps. That she might be able to save him, too. Rouse him from his sleep and drag him back down the corridor

But she takes another step. And another.

And then she sees him.

It is not Renly she sees, but a knight. His polished silver armour glows in the moonlight, and when he moves and turns the light catches on the polished blue sapphires that have been hammered artfully into his breastplate in the shape of a winter rose. He is holding his sword loosely at his side. Its tip is red with blood.

“Loras,” she says, forgetting herself in her shock. So he turns. Turns and sees her. His face, wet and shiny with tears, twists from grief to anger in an instant.

“Brienne the Beauty,” he says, voice as cold as ice.

“What happened?” she asks, though she knows, she _knows_. 

“I should have known you would come here,” he says. “You always turn up where you are not wanted. Renly joked of it often.”

She presses a hand out to the wall, a wave of dizziness suddenly overwhelms her and she can’t tell if it's his words or the smell of blood on the air or the knock on the head. It’s probably all of them at once, and the roiling feeling of loss that still clenches at her heart. It makes it hard to breathe.

“You killed him,” she says, still processing. “He was unarmed. He was helpless.”

Loras sniffles, scrubs at his face with his free hand. “Don’t. This was war.”

“He would have surrendered,” she says, though she knows, in her heart of hearts, that it is a lie. Renly had been so determined, so resolute. Perhaps this was the way it was always going to end. Dead and bloodied and all for nothing. 

“He died because his men betrayed him. They let us in, raised the gates and let us walk in on the promise of full bellies and a pardon. Men don’t stay loyal past the point of sense. Everyone has a breaking point. Everyone except you, it seems.”

He laughs then, laughs in her face. Behind her she hears the sounds of men in the corridor. She can hear their laughter, too, their joy, their unbridled blood-lust. She knows it won’t be much longer, and she tries to resign herself to her fate. At least Jaime is safely away; that gives her comfort. The only other thing she would want, at the end of it all, is a sword in her hand. She doesn’t like the thought of dying unarmed, like Renly. She does not want to go gently into the darkness. But then she isn’t sure she’d have the strength to hold a sword, even if she had one.

Loras steps forward. He raises his sword. The laughter dead in his throat.

Her heart pounds in her chest. She looks about the room for anything she might use to defend herself with. It is dark, and her eyes do not seem to want to focus properly, but in the little light of the moon she sees a familiar glimmer. Renly’s sword. It is an ornamental thing he’d hardly ever wielded himself, the hilt encrusted with gems hangs off a hook on his armour stand. It is a few steps away, but perhaps if she is quick she can get to it before Loras runs her through. She might last a few seconds more, and that would be enough. 

There is nothing for it. She lunges for the sword, but it is too far, or she is too close. What she thinks should be three steps away is just two and she slams into the armour stand, toppling it. She feels, more than sees Loras advancing on her in her confusion.

Behind him, the door opens. This is it. They are here. Here to finish what Jaime had only delayed.

She closes her eyes and braces for the blows. Thinks of her last, happy moments. The feel of lips on hers, her feet tangling with his in the bath, the pleasant warmth in her muscles after fighting with the wooden tourney swords. It is enough. It is enough.. it is…

But the expected strike never lands. Instead a sword clatters to the ground at her feet.

She opens her eyes. 

Loras stands above her but he is not alone. Behind him, pressed right up against his back, is Jaime. 

Loras makes a sound. A pathetic, strangled thing as he looks down and sees where her sword protrudes grotesquely from his stomach, glistening with gore and viscera in the moonlight. Jaime maneuvers him to the side and brings his foot up to the small of Loras’s back so that he can lever the sword slickly out. Loras stumbles forward, managing one step, and another, before he collapses on the edge of Renly’s bed, hands outstretched towards his jilted lover.

Brienne cannot look away. It is horrific, yet oddly compelling; a sight she doubts she’ll ever forget.

She cannot look away until she feels familiar hands take her own. Then it is easy. He is there. He’d come back for her, even when she’d sent him away. He lifts her from the floor with ease, making sure she is steady on her feet before he lets go and takes up her sword once more. 

“You came back,” she says, almost unable to hear her own voice, let alone believe the words she speaks.

“I had to,” he says, and cups her face with his hand. She leans into it, like a content cat.

“I sent you away. I didn’t want… This wasn’t…”

He brushes a finger across her lips, quieting her with that simple, soft touch. “I made a promise,” he says.

She remembers no such promise. 

“I could not leave you behind to die,” he says, and that is that.

* * *

He guides her back into the corridor, past the bodies of the Baratheon and Tyrell men he’d killed. Together they duck behind the tapestry and make their way down the dark passageway together. It is a long journey, in pitch blackness, but Jaime leads the way and Brienne follows behind, hand gripped tightly in his own. She feels no fear, not while he is here with her. She feels safe. Whatever is at the end of the tunnel, or in the sea beyond, she will not be facing it alone. He will be there with her, and that makes it easier to bear.

Jaime still holds her sword, but she has Renly’s strapped about her waist. He had made her take it when they left the room. It is heavy, but she is glad to have it. She is glad he thought to arm her, too.

“What shall you do if we manage to get out?” she asks as they walk. “Will you look for your brother?”

“Yes,” he says, with barely a pause. “I will find him, first, and make sure he is safe. And then I will return to my father and see what I can do to end this war for good. It has gone on too long as it is.”

In the distance she thinks she sees light. The end of the tunnel must be close and when she breathes in deeply, the smell of brine in the air confirms it. Just a few more steps and they’ll be free. “I will not stand in your way,” she says, quietly, though it hurts her a little inside.

“What?” He sounds confused.

“The… Our marriage. It is not a true one. I’m not your true wife. We never… I know Renly wrote to your father of it, but I will not hold you to vows you made under duress.” She is rambling, she knows it. But she is exhausted, and her head pounds worse than ever, and she wants nothing more than for this night to be over. She could not stop the words from pouring from her mouth if she tried.

“Brienne—”

She cuts him off. “No. It… You might be king, one day. You deserve someone who—”

He tugs her by the hand, a little roughly, but suddenly they have left the darkness and stand together in the dull dawning light of the cave. “You know when I said I never wanted to marry?” he says, turning to face her. It is not truly light here, but in contrast to the darkness of the tunnel they’d just left it is as bright as day. It is clear that beyond the mouth of the cave the sun will rise soon and day will break. They don’t have long if they want to make it past the siege lines without being noticed. She must make him understand.

“You wanted to be a knight,” she says, then, repeating his words. “You said you wanted to protect the weak and innocent. A noble goal, I don’t fault you for it—”

“It was not the whole truth,” he says, and squeezes her hand firmly, stopping the words in her throat. “My father always spoke of marriage as a way to control others, as a way to gain power and strength. He married my sister to Robert to forge an alliance and you know how well that went. I was expected to marry well. Marry some rich, pretty thing who was obedient and gave me many sons.”

“Oh,” she says, and tries to pull away, but he holds her tighter.

“No. You don’t understand.” he shakes his head. “I never wanted _that_ kind of marriage. I didn’t want the pretty wife. Money has never made me any happier. And for all my father’s power, it has only made him want more—look at where it’s got us.” 

He waves his sword at the roof of the cave, where Storm’s End rises tall above their heads. If it hasn’t already been torn down brick by brick by Renly’s men and the Tyrell army. “I did want to marry, but I wanted to marry for love. I wanted to marry someone I would be happy to spend every day of my life with. Someone who would challenge me and push me to be better, and who I could push just the same. I never thought I’d find her, but I was wrong.”

She looks down, her realisation dawning with the sun. There is no ribbon binding their hands, but his hand around hers feels just as right, the way he tangles their fingers together. Feeling a surge of bravery she wraps her hand around the one that holds her sword and with her other hand tugs him closer. 

“Brienne of Tarth. I am yours and you are mine. From this day to the end of my days.” He is sincere and he does not drop his gaze from hers. It is the first time she has truly felt comfortable with his eyes on hers. It makes her next words as easy as breathing.

“I am yours and you are mine,” she repeats, voice firm and strong. “From this day to the end of my days.”

He leans forward and kisses her again, more sweet and bright than any of their other kisses. This one full of impossible promise. She kisses him back, freely, openly, sealing their vows properly this time, in the eyes of gods, if not men.

Brienne doesn’t know what will await her when they leave the castle for good, but still she steps into the boat and sits across from him as he readies the oars and pushes off from the mooring. What she does know is that whatever may come, whatever they might face, they will face it together, hand in hand. One flesh, one heart, one soul.

Together.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much to Luthien, nire and robotsdance for their help with this chapter, and to everyone who kudosed, commented, bookmarked or said nice things to me about this fic. 
> 
> And while I have your attention: If you haven't heard about the [JB Festive Festival](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/JBFestiveFestivalExchange2020), it opens on the 25th and will have lots of great fanworks published. If you missed out on signing up for that, the good news is that you can participate in the [JB Festive Festival Stocking Stuffer Extravaganza](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/JBFestiveFestivalExchangeStockingStuffers2020), instead! The list of prompts is available at the link and the exchange is open now! So if you're feeling in the festive mood this season and wish to share the love with others, go create something for someone else!


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